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Leaves
of
Grass.
of
Grass.
Brooklyn, New York:
1855.
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AMERICA does not repel the past or what it
has produced under its forms or amid other politics or the idea of castes or the
old religions . . . .
accepts the
lesson with calmness . . . is not so impatient as has been supposed that the
slough still sticks to opinions and manners and literature while the life which
served its requirements has passed into the new life of the new
forms . . . perceives that the corpse is slowly borne from the eating and sleeping
rooms of the house . . .
perceives
that it waits a little while in the door . . . that it was fittest for its
days . . .
that its action has
descended to the stalwart and wellshaped heir who approaches . . .
and that he shall be fittest for his
days.
The Americans of all nations at any time upon the earth have
probably the fullest poetical nature.
The United States themselves are essentially
the greatest poem.
In the history of the earth hitherto the largest and most stirring
appear tame and orderly to their ampler largeness and stir.
Here at last is something in the doings of man that corresponds
with the broadcast doings of the day and night.
Here is not merely a nation but a teeming nation of nations.
Here is action untied from strings necessarily blind to
particulars and details magnificently moving in vast masses.
Here is the hospitality which forever indicates heroes . . . .
Here are the roughs and beards and space and ruggedness and nonchalance that the
soul loves.
Here the performance disdaining the trivial unapproached in the
tremendous audacity of its crowds and groupings and the push of its perspective
spreads with crampless and flowing breadth and showers its prolific and splendid
extravagance.
One sees it must indeed own the riches of the summer and winter,
and need never be bankrupt while corn grows from the ground or the orchards drop
apples or the bays contain fish or men beget children upon women.
Other states indicate themselves in their deputies . . . . but the
genius of the United States is not best or most in its executives or legislatures,
nor in its ambassadors or authors or colleges or churches or parlors, nor even in
its newspapers or inventors . . . but always most in the common people.
Their manners speech dress friendships—the freshness and candor of
their physiognomy—
the picturesque looseness of their
carriage . . . their deathless attachment to freedom—their aversion to anything
indecorous or soft or mean—the practical acknowledgment of the citizens of one
state by the citizens of all other states—the fierceness of their roused
resentment—
their curiosity and welcome of novelty—their self-esteem and wonderful
sympathy—their susceptibility to a slight—
the air they have of persons who never
knew how it felt to stand in the presence of superiors—
the fluency of their speech—their delight in music, the sure symptom of manly
tenderness and native elegance of soul . . . their good temper and
openhandedness—
the terrible significance of their
elections—the President's taking off his hat to them not they to him—these too are
unrhymed poetry.
It awaits the gigantic and generous treatment worthy of
it.
The largeness of nature or the nation were monstrous without a
corresponding largeness and generosity of the spirit of the citizen.
Not nature nor swarming states nor streets and steamships nor
prosperous business nor farms nor capital nor learning may suffice for the ideal
of man . . . nor suffice the poet.
No reminiscences may suffice either.
A live nation can always cut a deep mark and can have the best
authority the cheapest . . . namely from its own soul.
This is the sum of the profitable uses of individuals or states
and of present action and grandeur and of the subjects of poets.—
As if it were necessary to trot back generation after generation to
the eastern records!
As if the beauty and sacredness of the demonstrable must fall
behind that of the mythical!
As if men do not make their mark out of any times!
As if the opening of the western continent by discovery and what
has transpired since in North and South America were less than the small theatre
of the antique or the aimless sleepwalking of the middle ages!
The pride of the United States leaves the wealth and finesse of
the cities and all returns of commerce and agriculture and all the magnitude of
geography or
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iv shows of exterior victory to enjoy the breed of fullsized men or one fullsized man unconquerable and simple.
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iv shows of exterior victory to enjoy the breed of fullsized men or one fullsized man unconquerable and simple.
The American poets are to enclose old and new for America is the
race of races.
Of them a bard is to be commensurate with a people.
To him the other continents arrive as contributions . . . he gives
them reception for their sake and his own sake.
His spirit responds to his country's spirit . . . .
he incarnates its geography and natural life and rivers and
lakes.
Mississippi with annual freshets and changing chutes, Missouri and
Columbia and Ohio and Saint Lawrence with the falls and beautiful masculine
Hudson, do not embouchure where they spend themselves more than they embouchure
into him.
The blue breadth over the inland sea of Virginia and Maryland and
the sea off Massachusetts and Maine and over Manhattan bay and over Champlain and
Erie and over Ontario and Huron and Michigan and Superior, and over the Texan and
Mexican and Floridian and Cuban seas and over the seas off California and Oregon,
is not tallied by the blue breadth of the waters below more than the breadth of
above and below is tallied by him.
When the long Atlantic coast stretches longer and the Pacific
coast stretches longer he easily stretches with them north or south.
He spans between them also from east to west and reflects what is
between them.
On him rise solid growths that offset the growths of pine and
cedar and hemlock and liveoak and locust and chestnut and cypress and hickory and
limetree and cottonwood and tuliptree and cactus and wildvine and tamarind and
persimmon . . . .
and tangles as tangled as any canebrake or swamp . . . .
and forests coated with transparent ice and icicles hanging from
the boughs and crackling in the wind . . . . and sides and peaks of
mountains . . . .
and pasturage sweet and free as savannah or upland or
prairie . . . .
with flights and songs and screams that answer those of the
wildpigeon and highhold and orchard-oriole and coot and surf-duck and
redshouldered-hawk and fish-hawk and white-ibis and indian-hen and cat-owl and
water-pheasant and qua-bird and pied-sheldrake and blackbird and mockingbird and
buzzard and condor and night-heron and eagle.
To him the hereditary countenance descends both mother's and
father's.
To him enter the essences of the real things and past and present
events—
of the enormous diversity of temperature and
agriculture and mines—
the tribes of red
aborigines—
the
weatherbeaten vessels entering new ports or making
landings on rocky coasts—the first settlements north or south—the rapid stature
and muscle—
the haughty defiance of '76, and the war and
peace and formation of the constitution . . . .
the union always surrounded by blatherers and always calm and
impregnable—
the perpetual coming of immigrants—
the wharf hem'd cities
superior marine—
the unsurveyed interior—the
loghouses and clearings and wild animals and hunters and trappers . . . .
the free commerce—the fisheries and whaling and
gold-digging—
the endless gestation of new
states—
the convening of Congress every December, the
members duly coming up from all climates and the uttermost parts . . . .
the noble character of the young mechanics and of all free
American workmen and workwomen . . . .
the general ardor and friendliness and enterprise—
the perfect equality of the female with the male . . . .
the large amativeness—
the fluid movement
of the population—
the factories and mercantile life and
laborsaving machinery—
the Yankee swap—the New York
firemen and the target excursion—the southern plantation life—
the character of the
northeast and of the northwest and southwest—
slavery and
the tremulous spreading of hands to protect it,
and the stern opposition to it
which shall never cease till it ceases or the speaking of tongues and the moving
of lips cease.
For such the expression of the American poet is to be transcendant
and new.
It is to be indirect and not direct or descriptive or epic.
Its quality goes through these to much more.
Let the age and wars of other nations be chanted and their eras
and characters be illustrated and that finish the verse.
Not so the great psalm of the republic.
Here the theme is creative and has vista.
Here comes one among the wellbeloved stonecutters and plans with
decision and science and sees the solid and beautiful forms of the future where
there are now no solid forms.
Of all nations the United States with veins full of poetical stuff
most need poets and will doubtless have the greatest and use them the
greatest.
Their Presidents shall not be their common referee so much as
their poets shall.
Of all mankind the great poet is the equable man.
Not in him but off from him things are grotesque or eccentric or
fail of their sanity.
Nothing out of its place is good and nothing in its place is
bad.
He bestows on every object or quality its fit proportions neither
more nor less.
He is the arbiter of the diverse and he is the key.
He is the equalizer of his age and land . . . .
he supplies what wants supplying and checks what wants
checking.
If peace is the routine out of him speaks the spirit of peace,
large, rich, thrifty, building vast and populous cities, encouraging agriculture
and the arts and commerce—lighting the study of man, the soul,
immortality—federal, state or municipal government,
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v marriage, health, freetrade, intertravel by land and sea . . . .
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v marriage, health, freetrade, intertravel by land and sea . . . .
nothing too close, nothing too far off . . . the stars not too far
off.
In war he is the most deadly force of the war.
Who recruits him recruits horse and foot . . . he fetches parks
of artillery the best that engineer ever knew.
If the time becomes slothful and heavy he knows how to arouse
it . . . he can make every word he speaks draw blood.
Whatever stagnates in the flat of custom or obedience or
legislation he never stagnates.
Obedience does not master him, he masters it.
High up out of reach he stands turning a concentrated
light . . . he turns the pivot with his finger . . . he baffles the swiftest
runners as he stands and easily overtakes and envelops them.
The time straying toward infidelity and confections and persiflage
he withholds by his steady faith . . .
he spreads out his
dishes . . .
he offers the sweet firmfibred meat that
grows men and women.
His brain is the ultimate brain.
He is no arguer . . . he is judgment.
He judges not as the judge judges but as the sun falling around a
helpless thing.
As he sees the farthest he has the most faith.
His thoughts are the hymns of the praise of things.
In the talk on the soul and eternity and God off of his equal
plane he is silent.
He sees eternity less like a play with a prologue and
denouement . . . .
he sees eternity in men and women . . . he does not see men and
women as dreams or dots.
Faith is the antiseptic of the soul . . . it pervades the common
people and preserves them . . . they never give up believing and expecting and
trusting.
There is that indescribable freshness and unconsciousness about
an illiterate person that humbles and mocks the power of the noblest expressive
genius.
The poet sees for a certainty how one not a great artist may be
just as sacred and perfect as the greatest artist. . . . . .
The power to destroy or remould is freely used by him but never the
power of attack.
What is past is past.
If he does not expose superior models and prove himself by every
step he takes he is not what is wanted.
The presence of the greatest poet conquers . . . not parleying or
struggling or any prepared attempts.
Now he has passed that way see after him!
there is not left any vestige of despair or misanthropy or
cunning or exclusiveness or the ignominy of a nativity or color or delusion of
hell or the necessity of hell . . . . .
and no man
thenceforward shall be degraded for ignorance or weakness or sin.
The greatest poet hardly knows pettiness or triviality.
If he breathes into any thing that was before thought small it
dilates with the grandeur and life of the universe.
He is a seer . . . . he is individual . . . he is complete in
himself . . . . the others are as good as he, only he sees it and they do
not.
He is not one of the chorus . . . . he does not stop for any
regulation . . . he is the president of regulation.
What the eyesight does to the rest he does to the rest. Who knows
the curious mystery of the eyesight? The other senses corroborate themselves, but
this is removed from any proof but its own and foreruns the identities of the
spiritual world. A single glance of it mocks all the investigations of man and all
the instruments and books of the earth and all reasoning. What is marvellous? what
is unlikely? what is impossible or baseless or vague? after you have once just
opened the space of a peachpit and given audience to far and near and to the
sunset and had all things enter with electric swiftness softly and duly without
confusion or jostling or jam.
The land and sea, the animals fishes and birds, the sky of heaven
and the orbs, the forests mountains and rivers, are not small themes . . . but
folks expect of the poet to indicate more than the beauty and dignity which always
attach to dumb real objects . . . . they expect him to indicate the path between
reality and their souls.
Men and women perceive the beauty well enough . . probably as
well as he.
The passionate tenacity of hunters, woodmen, early risers,
cultivators of gardens and orchards and fields, the love of healthy women for the
manly form, seafaring persons, drivers of horses, the passion for light and the
open air, all is an old varied sign of the unfailing perception of beauty and of a
residence of the poetic in outdoor people.
They can never be assisted by poets to perceive . . . some may
but they never can.
The poetic quality is not marshalled in rhyme or uniformity or
abstract addresses to things nor in melancholy complaints or good precepts, but is
the life of these and much else and is in the soul.
The profit of rhyme is that it drops seeds of a sweeter and more
luxuriant rhyme, and of uniformity that it conveys itself into its own roots in
the ground out of sight.
The rhyme and uniformity of perfect poems show the free growth of
metrical laws and bud from them as unerringly and loosely as lilacs or roses on a
bush, and take shapes as compact as the shapes of chestnuts and oranges and melons
and pears, and shed the perfume impalpable to form.
The fluency and ornaments of the finest poems or music or
orations or recitations are not independent but dependent.
All beauty comes from beautiful blood and a beautiful
brain.
If the greatnesses are in conjunction in a man or woman it is
enough . . . . the fact will prevail through the universe . . . . but the gaggery
and gilt of a million years will not prevail.
Who troubles himself about his ornaments or fluency is
lost.
This is what you
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vi shall do: Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches,
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vi shall do: Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches,
give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and
crazy, devote your income and labor to others,
hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and
indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to
any man or number of men,
go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and
with the mothers of families,
read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of
your life,
re examine all you have been told at school or church or in any
book,
dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall
be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the
silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every
motion and joint of your body. . . . . . . .
The poet shall not spend his time in unneeded work.
He shall know that the ground is always ready ploughed and
manured . . . . others may not know it but he shall.
He shall go directly to the creation.
His trust shall master the trust of everything he touches . . . .
and shall master all attachment.
The known universe has one complete lover and that is the
greatest poet.
He consumes an eternal passion and is indifferent which chance
happens and which possible contingency of fortune or misfortune and persuades
daily and hourly his delicious pay.
What balks or breaks others is fuel for his burning progress to
contact and amorous joy.
Other proportions of the reception of pleasure dwindle to nothing
to his proportions.
All expected from heaven or from the highest he is rapport with
in the sight of the daybreak or a scene of the winter woods or the presence of
children playing or with his arm round the neck of a man or woman.
His love above all love has leisure and expanse . . . . he leaves
room ahead of himself.
He is no irresolute or suspicious lover . . . he is sure . . . he
scorns intervals.
His experience and the showers and thrills are not for
nothing.
Nothing can jar him . . . . suffering and darkness cannot—death
and fear cannot.
To him complaint and jealousy and envy are corpses buried and
rotten in the earth . . . . he saw them buried.
The sea is not surer of the shore or the shore of the sea than he
is of the fruition of his love and of all perfection and beauty.
The fruition of beauty is no chance of hit or miss . . . it is
inevitable as life . . . . it is exact and plumb as gravitation.
From the eyesight proceeds another eyesight and from the hearing
proceeds another hearing and from the voice proceeds another voice eternally
curious of the harmony of things with man.
To these respond perfections not only in the committees that were
supposed to stand for the rest but in the rest themselves just the same.
These understand the law of perfection in masses and
floods . . . that its finish is to each for itself and onward from
itself . . . that it is profuse and impartial . . . that there is not a minute of
the light or dark nor an acre of the earth or
sea without it—nor any direction of the sky nor any trade or employment nor any
turn of events.
This is the reason that about the proper expression of beauty
there is precision and balance . . . one part does not need to be thrust above
another.
The best singer is not the one who has the most lithe and
powerful organ . . . the pleasure of poems is not in them that take the handsomest
measure and similes and sound.
Without effort and without exposing in the least how it is done
the greatest poet brings the spirit of any or all events and passions and scenes
and persons some more and some less to bear on your individual character as you
hear or read.
To do this well is to compete with the laws that pursue and
follow time.
What is the purpose must surely be there and the clue of it must
be there . . . . and the faintest indication is the indication of the best and
then becomes the clearest indication.
Past and present and future are not disjoined but joined.
The greatest poet forms the consistence of what is to be from
what has been and is.
He drags the dead out of their coffins and stands them again on
their feet . . . . he says to the past, Rise and walk before me that I may realize
you.
He learns the lesson . . . . he places himself where the future
becomes present.
The greatest poet does not only dazzle his rays over character
and scenes and passions . . . he finally ascends and finishes all . . .
he exhibits the pinnacles that no man can tell what they are for or
what is beyond . . . . he glows a moment on the extremest verge.
He is most wonderful in his last half-hidden smile or
frown . . . by that flash of the moment of parting the one that sees it shall be
encouraged or terrified afterward for many years.
The greatest poet does not moralize or make applications of
morals . . . he knows the soul.
The soul has that measureless pride which consists in never
acknowledging any lessons but its own.
But it has sympathy as measureless as its pride and the one
balances the other and neither can stretch too far while it stretches in company
with the other.
The inmost secrets of art sleep with the twain.
The greatest poet has lain close betwixt both and they are vital
in his style and thoughts.
The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the
light of letters is simplicity.
Nothing is better than simplicity . . . . nothing
make up for excess or for the lack of
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vii
To carry on the heave of impulse and pierce intellectual depths
and give all subjects their articulations are powers neither common nor very
uncommon.
But to speak in literature with the perfect rectitude and
insousiance of the movements of animals and the unimpeachableness of the sentiment
of trees in the woods and grass by the roadside is the flawless triumph of
art.
If you have looked on him who has achieved it you have looked on
one of the masters of the artists of all nations and times.
You shall not contemplate the flight of the graygull over the bay
or the mettlesome action of the blood horse or the tall leaning of sunflowers on
their stalk or the appearance of the sun journeying through heaven or the
appearance of the moon afterward with any more satisfaction than you shall
contemplate him.
The greatest poet has less a marked style and is more the channel
of thoughts and things without increase or diminution, and is the free channel of
himself.
He swears to his art, I will not be meddlesome,
I will not have in my writing any elegance or effect
or originality to hang in the way between me and the rest like curtains.
I will have nothing hang in the way, not the richest
curtains.
What I tell I tell for precisely what it is.
Let who may exalt or startle or fascinate or sooth I will have
purposes as health or heat or snow has and be as regardless of observation.
What I experience or portray shall go from my composition without
a shred of my composition.
You shall stand by my side and look in the mirror with
me.
The old red blood and stainless gentility of great poets will be
proved by their unconstraint.
A heroic person walks at his ease through and out of that custom
or precedent or authority that suits him not.
Of the traits of the brotherhood of writers savans musicians
inventors and artists nothing is finer than silent defiance advancing from new
free forms.
In the need of poems philosophy politics mechanism science
behaviour, the craft of art, an appropriate native grand-opera, shipcraft, or any
craft, he is greatest forever and forever who contributes the greatest original
practical example.
The cleanest expression is that which finds no sphere worthy of
itself and makes one.
The messages of great poets to each man and woman are, Come to us
on equal terms, Only then can you understand us, We are no better than you, What
we enclose you enclose, What we enjoy you may enjoy.
Did you suppose there could be only one Supreme?
We affirm there can be unnumbered Supremes, and that one does
not countervail another any more than one eyesight countervails another . . and
that men can be good or grand only of the consciousness of their supremacy within
them.
What do you think is the grandeur of storms and dismemberments
and the deadliest battles and wrecks and the wildest fury of the elements and the
power of the sea and the motion of nature and of the throes of human desires and
dignity and hate and love?
It is that something in the soul which says, Rage on, Whirl on, I
tread master here and everywhere, Master of the spasms of the sky and of the
shatter of the sea, Master of nature and passion and death, And of all terror and
all pain.
The American bards shall be marked for generosity and affection
and for encouraging competitors . .
They shall be
kosmos . . without monopoly or
secresy
. . glad to pass any thing to any one . . hungry for equals night and
day.
They shall not be careful of riches and privilege . . . . they
shall be riches and privilege . . . . they shall perceive who the most affluent
man is.
The most affluent man is he that confronts all the shows he sees
by equivalents out of the stronger wealth of himself.
The American bard shall delineate no class of persons nor one or
two out of the strata of interests nor love most nor truth most nor the soul most
nor the body most . . . .
and not be for the eastern states more than the western or the
northern states more than the southern.
Exact science and its practical movements are no checks on the
greatest poet but always his encouragement and support.
The outset and remembrance are there . . there the arms that
lifted him first and brace him best . . . . there he returns after all his goings
and comings.
The sailor and traveler . .
the
anatomist chemist astronomer geologist phrenologist spiritualist mathematician
historian and lexicographer are not poets, but they are the lawgivers of poets and
their construction underlies the structure of every perfect poem.
No matter what rises or is uttered they sent the seed of the
conception of it . . . of them and by them stand the visible proofs of
souls . . . . . always of their fatherstuff must be begotten the sinewy races of
bards.
If there shall be love and content between the father and the son
and if the greatness of the son is the exuding of the greatness of the father
there shall be love between the poet and the man of demonstrable science.
In the beauty of poems are the tuft and final applause of
science.
Great is the faith of the flush of knowledge and of the
investigation of the depths of qualities and things.
Cleaving and circling here swells the soul of the poet yet
it president of itself always.
The depths are fathomless and therefore calm.
The innocence and nakedness are resumed . . . they are neither
modest nor immodest.
The whole theory of the special and supernatural and all that was
twined with it or educed out of it departs as a dream.
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viii
What has ever happened . . . . what happens and whatever may or
shall happen, the vital laws enclose all . . . . they are sufficient for any case
and for all cases . . . none to be hurried or retarded . . . .
any miracle of affairs or persons inadmissible in the vast clear
scheme where every motion and every spear of grass and the frames and spirits of
men and women and all that concerns them are unspeakably perfect miracles all
referring to all and each distinct and in its place.
It is also not consistent with the reality of the soul to admit
that there is anything in the known universe more divine than men and
women.
Men and women and the earth and all upon it are simply to be
taken as they are, and the investigation of their past and present and future
shall be unintermitted and shall be done with perfect candor.
Upon this basis philosophy speculates ever looking toward the
poet, ever regarding the eternal tendencies of all toward happiness never
inconsistent with what is clear to the senses and to the soul.
For the eternal tendencies of all toward happiness make the only
point of sane philosophy.
Whatever comprehends less than that . . . whatever is less than
the laws of light and of astronomical motion . . . or less than the laws that
follow the thief the liar the glutton and the drunkard through this life and
doubtless afterward . . . . . . or less than vast stretches of time or the slow
formation of density or the patient upheaving of strata—is of no account.
Whatever would put God in a poem or system of philosophy as
contending against some being or influence is also of no account.
Sanity and ensemble characterise the great master . . . spoilt in
one principle all is spoilt.
The great master has nothing to do with miracles.
He sees health for himself in being one of the mass . . . . he
sees the hiatus in singular eminence.
To the perfect shape comes common ground.
To be under the general law is great for that is to correspond
with it.
The master knows that he is unspeakably great and that all are
unspeakably great . . . . that nothing for instance is greater than to conceive
children and bring them up well . . . that to be is just as great as to perceive
or tell.
In the make of the great masters the idea of political liberty is
indispensible.
Liberty takes the adherence of heroes wherever men and women
exist . . . . but never takes any adherence or welcome from the rest more than
from poets.
They are the voice and exposition of liberty.
They out of ages are worthy the grand idea . . . . to them it is
confided and they must sustain it.
Nothing has precedence of it and nothing can warp or degrade
it.
The attitude of great poets is to cheer up slaves and horrify
despots.
The turn of their necks, the sound of their feet, the motions of
their wrists, are full of hazard to the one and hope to the other.
Come nigh them awhile and though they neither speak or advise you
shall learn the faithful American lesson.
Liberty is poorly served by men whose good intent is quelled from
one failure or two failures or any number of failures,
or from the casual indifference or ingratitude of the
people,
or from the sharp show of the tushes of power, or the bringing to
bear soldiers and cannon or any penal statutes.
Liberty relies upon itself, invites no one, promises nothing,
sits in calmness and light, is positive and composed, and knows no
discouragement.
The battle rages with many a loud alarm and frequent advance and
retreat . . . .
the enemy triumphs . . . .
the prison, the handcuffs, the iron necklace and anklet, the
scaffold, garrote and leadballs do their work . . . .
the cause is asleep . . . . the strong throats are choked with
their own blood . . . .
the young men drop their eyelashes toward the ground when they
pass each other . . . .
and is liberty gone out of that place? No never.
When liberty goes it is not the first to go nor the second or
third to go . .
it waits for all the rest to go . . it
is the last . . .
When the memories of the old martyrs
are faded utterly away . . . .
when the large names of patriots are laughed at in the public
halls from the lips of the orators . . . .
when the boys are no more christened after the same but
christened after tyrants and traitors instead . . . .
when the laws of the free are grudgingly permitted and laws for
informers and bloodmoney are sweet to the taste of the people . . . .
when I and you walk abroad upon the earth stung with compassion
at the sight of numberless brothers answering our equal friendship and calling no
man master—and when we are elated with noble joy at the sight of
slaves . . . .
when the soul retires in the cool communion of the night and
surveys its experience and has much extasy over the word and deed that put back a
helpless innocent person into the gripe of the gripers or into any cruel
inferiority . . . .
when those in all parts of these states who could easier realize
the true American character but do not yet—
when the
swarms of cringers, suckers, doughfaces, lice of politics, planners of sly
involutions for their own preferment to city offices or state legislatures or the
judiciary or congress or the presidency, obtain a response of love and natural
deference from the people whether they get the offices or no . . . .
when it is better to be a bound booby and rogue in office at a
high salary than the poorest free mechanic or farmer with his hat unmoved from his
head and firm eyes and a candid and generous heart . . . .
and when servility by town or state or the federal government or
any oppression on a large
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ix scale or small scale can be tried on without its own punishment following duly after in exact proportion against the smallest chance of escape . . . .
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ix scale or small scale can be tried on without its own punishment following duly after in exact proportion against the smallest chance of escape . . . .
or rather when all life and all the souls of men and women are
discharged from any part of the earth—
then only shall
the instinct of liberty be discharged from that part of the earth.
As the attributes of the poets of the kosmos concentre in the
real body and soul and in the pleasure of things they possess the superiority of
genuineness over all fiction and romance.
As they emit themselves facts are showered over with
light . . . .
the daylight is lit with more volatile light . . . . also the
deep between the setting and rising sun goes deeper many fold.
Each precise object or condition or combination or process
exhibits a beauty . . . . the multiplication table its—old age its—the carpenter's
trade its—the grand-opera its . . . .
the hugehulled cleanshaped New-York
clipper at sea under steam or full sail gleams with unmatched beauty . . . .
the American circles and large harmonies of government gleam with
theirs . . . .
and the commonest definite intentions and actions with
theirs.
The poets of the kosmos advance through all interpositions and
coverings and turmoils and stratagems to first principles.
They are of use . . . . they dissolve poverty from its need and
riches from its conceit.
You large proprietor they say shall not realize or perceive more
than any one else.
The owner of the library is not he who holds a legal title to it
having bought and paid for it.
Any one and every one is owner of the library who can read the
same through all the varieties of tongues and subjects and styles, and in whom
they enter with ease and take residence and force toward paternity and maternity,
and make supple and powerful and rich and large. . . . . . . . .
These American states strong and healthy and accomplished shall
receive no pleasure from violations of natural models and must not permit
them.
In paintings or mouldings or carvings in mineral or wood, or in
the illustrations of books or newspapers, or in any comic or tragic prints, or in
the patterns of woven stuffs or any thing to beautify rooms or furniture or
costumes, or to put upon cornices or monuments or on the prows or sterns of ships,
or to put anywhere before the human eye indoors or out, that which distorts honest
shapes or which creates unearthly beings or places or contingencies is a nuisance
and revolt.
Of the human form especially it is so great it must never be made
ridiculous.
Of ornaments to a work nothing outre can be allowed . . but those
ornaments can be allowed that conform to the perfect facts of the open air and
that flow out of the nature of the work and come irrepressibly from it and are
necessary to the completion of the work.
Most works are most beautiful without ornament . . .
Exaggerations will be revenged in human physiology.
Clean and vigorous children are jetted and conceived only in
those communities where the models of natural forms are public every
day. . . . .
Great genius and the people of these states must never be
demeaned to romances.
As soon as histories are properly told there is no more need of
romances.
The great poets are also to be known by the absence in them of
tricks and by the justification of perfect personal candor.
Then folks echo a new cheap joy and a divine voice leaping from
their brains: How beautiful is candor!
All faults may be forgiven of him who has perfect candor.
Henceforth let no man of us lie, for we have seen that openness
wins the inner and outer world and that there is no single exception, and that
never since our earth gathered itself in a mass have deceit or subterfuge or
prevarication attracted its smallest particle or the faintest tinge of a
shade—
and that through the enveloping wealth and rank of
a state or the whole republic of states a sneak or sly person shall be discovered
and despised . . . .
and that the soul has never been once fooled and never can be
fooled . . . .
and thrift without the loving nod of the soul is only a fœtid
puff . . . .
and there never grew up in any of the continents of the globe nor
upon any planet or satellite or star, nor upon the asteroids, nor in any part of
ethereal space, nor in the midst of density, nor under the fluid wet of the sea,
nor in that condition which precedes the birth of babes, nor at any time during
the changes of life, nor in that condition that follows what we term death, nor in
any stretch of abeyance or action afterward of vitality, nor in any process of
formation or reformation anywhere, a being whose instinct hated the
truth.
Extreme caution or prudence, the soundest organic health, large
hope and comparison and fondness for women and children, large alimentiveness and
destructiveness and causality, with a perfect sense of the oneness of nature and
the propriety of the same spirit applied to human affairs . .
these are called up of the float of the brain of the world to be
parts of the greatest poet from his birth out of his mother's womb and from her
birth out of her mother's.
Caution seldom goes far enough.
It has been thought that the prudent citizen was the citizen who
applied himself to solid gains and did well for himself and his family and
completed a lawful life without debt or crime.
The greatest poet sees and admits these economies as he sees the
economies of food and sleep, but has higher notions of prudence than to think he
gives much when he gives
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x a few slight attentions at the latch of the gate.
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x a few slight attentions at the latch of the gate.
The premises of the prudence of life are not the hospitality of
it or the ripeness and harvest of it.
Beyond the independence of a little sum laid aside for
burial-money,
and of a few clapboards around and shingles overhead on a lot of
American soil owned,
and the easy dollars that supply the year's plain clothing
and meals,
the melancholy prudence of the abandonment of such a great being as a
man is to the toss and pallor of years of moneymaking with all their scorching
days and icy nights
and all their stifling deceits and underhanded dodgings, or
infinitessimals of parlors, or shameless stuffing while others
starve . .
and all the loss of the bloom and odor of the
earth and of the flowers and atmosphere and of the sea and of the true taste of
the women and men you pass or have to do with in youth or middle age,
and the
issuing sickness and desperate revolt at the close of a life without elevation or
naivete,
and the ghastly chatter of a death without serenity or majesty,
is the
great fraud upon modern civilization and forethought, blotching the surface and
system which civilization undeniably drafts, and moistening with tears the immense
features it spreads and spreads with such velocity before the reached kisses of
the soul . . .
Still the right explanation remains to be
made about prudence.
The prudence of the mere wealth and respectability of the most
esteemed life appears too faint for the eye to observe at all when little and
large alike drop quietly aside at the thought of the prudence suitable for
immortality.
What is wisdom that fills the thinness of a year or seventy or
eighty years to wisdom spaced out by ages and coming back at a certain time with
strong reinforcements and rich presents and the clear faces of wedding-guests as
far as you can look in every direction running gaily toward you?
Only the soul is of itself . . . .
all else has reference to what ensues.
All that a person does or thinks is of consequence.
Not a move can a man or woman make that affects him or her in a
day or a month or any part of the direct lifetime or the hour of death
but the
same affects him or her onward afterward through the indirect lifetime.
The indirect is always as great and real as the direct.
The spirit receives from the body just as much as it gives to the
body.
Not one name of word or deed . . not of venereal sores or discolorations . . not the privacy of the onanist . .
not of the putrid veins of gluttons or rumdrinkers . . . not peculation or cunning or betrayal or murder . . no serpentine poison of those that seduce women . . not the foolish yielding of women . . not prostitution . . not of any depravity of young men . . not of the attainment of gain by discreditable means . . not any nastiness of appetite . . not any harshness of officers to men or judges to prisoners or fathers to sons or sons to fathers or of husbands to wives or bosses to their boys . . not of greedy looks or malignant wishes . . . nor any of the wiles practised by people upon themselves . . .
ever is or ever can be stamped on the programme but it is duly realized and returned, and that returned in further performances . . . and they returned again.
Nor can the push of charity or personal force ever be any thing
else than the profoundest reason, whether it bring arguments to hand or no.
No specification is necessary . . to add or subtract or divide is
in vain.
Little or big, learned or unlearned, white or black, legal or
illegal, sick or well, from the first inspiration down the windpipe to the last
expiration out of it,
all that a male or female does that is vigorous and benevolent
and clean is so much sure profit to him or her
in the unshakable order of the
universe and through the whole scope of it forever.
If the savage or felon is wise it is well . . . . if the greatest
poet or savan is wise it is simply the same . . if the President or chief justice
is wise it is the same . . . if the young mechanic or farmer is wise it is no more
or less . . if the prostitute is wise it is no more nor less.
The interest will come round . . all will come round.
All the best actions of war and peace . . .
all help given to relatives and strangers and the poor and old and
sorrowful and young children and widows and the sick, and to all shunned
persons . .
all furtherance of fugitives and of the
escape of slaves . .
all the self-denial that stood
steady and aloof on wrecks and saw others take the seats of the
boats . . .
all offering of substance or life for the
good old cause, or for a friend's sake or opinion's sake . . .
all pains of enthusiasts scoffed at by their
neighbors . .
all the vast sweet love and precious
suffering of mothers . . .
all honest men baffled in
strifes recorded or unrecorded . . . .
all the grandeur and good of the few ancient nations whose
fragments of annals we inherit . .
and all the good of
the hundreds of far mightier and more ancient nations unknown to us by name or
date or location . . . .
all that was ever manfully begun, whether it succeeded or
no . . . .
all that has at any time been well suggested out of the divine
heart of man or by the divinity of his mouth or by the shaping of his great
hands . .
and all that is well thought or done this day
on any part of the surface of the globe . . or on any of the wandering stars or
fixed stars by those there as we are here . .
or that is
henceforth to be well thought or done by you whoever you are, or by any
one—
these singly and wholly inured at their time and
inure now and will inure always to the identities from which they sprung or shall
spring . . .
Did you guess any of them lived only its
mo-
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ximent ?
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ximent ?
The world does not so exist . . no parts palpable or impalpable
so exist . . .
no result exists now without being from
its long antecedent result, and that from its antecedent,
and so backward without
the farthest mentionable spot coming a bit nearer the beginning than any other
spot. . . . .
Whatever satisfies the soul is truth.
The prudence of the greatest poet answers at last the craving and
glut of the soul,
is not contemptuous of less ways of prudence if they conform to
its ways, puts off nothing, permits no let-up for its own case or any case, has no
particular sabbath or judgment-day,
divides not the living from the dead or the righteous from the
unrighteous,
is satisfied with the present,
matches every thought or act by its correlative,
knows no possible forgiveness or deputed atonement . .
knows that the young man who composedly periled his life and lost
it has done exceeding well for himself,
while the man who has not periled his life and retains it to old
age in riches and ease has perhaps achieved nothing for himself worth
mentioning . .
and that only that person has no great
prudence to learn who has learnt to prefer real longlived things,
and favors body and soul the same,
and perceives the indirect assuredly following the direct,
and what evil or good he does leaping onward and waiting to meet
him again—
and who in his spirit in any emergency
whatever neither hurries or avoids death.
The direct trial of him who would be the greatest poet is
today.
If he does not flood himself with the immediate age as with vast
oceanic tides . . . . .
and if he does not attract his
own land body and soul to himself and hang on its neck with incomparable love
and
plunge his semitic muscle into its merits and demerits . . .
and if he be not himself the age transfigured . . . .
and if to him is not opened the eternity which gives similitude
to all periods and locations and processes and animate and inanimate forms, and
which is the bond of time, and rises up from its inconceivable vagueness and
infiniteness in the swimming shape of today, and is held by the ductile anchors of
life, and makes the present spot the passage from what was to what shall be, and
commits itself to the representation of this wave of an hour and this one of the
sixty beautiful children of the wave—
let him merge in
the general run and wait his
developement
. . . . . . . .
Still the final test of poems or any character or work
remains.
The prescient poet projects himself centuries ahead and judges
performer or performance after the changes of time.
Does it live through them?
Does it still hold on untired?
Will the same style and the direction of genius to similar points
be satisfactory now?
Has no new discovery in science or arrival at superior planes of
thought and judgment and behaviour fixed him or his so that either can be looked
down upon?
Have the marches of tens and hundreds and thousands of years made
willing detours to the right hand and the left hand for his sake?
Is he beloved long and long after he is buried?
Does the young man think often of him? and the young woman think
often of him? and do the middleaged and the old think of him?
A great poem is for ages and ages in common and for all degrees
and complexions and all departments and sects and for a woman as much as a man and
a man as much as a woman.
A great poem is no finish to a man or woman but rather a
beginning.
Has any one fancied he could sit at last under some due authority
and rest satisfied with explanations and realize and be content and full?
To no such terminus does the greatest poet bring . . .
he brings neither cessation or sheltered fatness and ease.
The touch of him tells in action.
Whom he takes he takes with firm sure grasp into live regions
previously unattained . . . . thenceforward is no rest . . . . they see the space
and ineffable sheen that turn the old spots and lights into dead vacuums.
The companion of him beholds the birth and progress of stars and
learns one of the meanings.
Now there shall be a man cohered out of tumult and
chaos . . . .
the elder encourages the younger and shows him
how . . .
they two shall launch off fearlessly together
till the new world fits an orbit for itself and looks unabashed on the lesser
orbits of the stars and sweeps through the ceaseless rings and shall never be
quiet again.
There will soon be no more priests. Their work is done.
They may wait awhile . . perhaps a generation or two . . dropping
off by degrees.
A superior breed shall take their place . . . .
the gangs of kosmos and prophets en masse shall take their
place.
A new order shall arise and they shall be the priests of man, and
every man shall be his own priest.
The churches built under their umbrage shall be the churches of
men and women.
Through the divinity of themselves shall the kosmos and the new
breed of poets be interpreters of men and women and of all events and
things.
They shall find their inspiration in real objects today, symptoms
of the past and future . . . .
They shall not deign to defend immortality or God or the
perfection of things or liberty or the exquisite beauty and reality of the
soul.
They shall arise in America and be responded to from the
remainder of the earth.
The English language befriends the grand American
expression . . . . it is brawny enough and limber and full enough.
On the tough stock of a race who through all change of
circumstance was never
with-
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xiiout the idea of political liberty, which is the animus of all liberty, it has attracted the terms of daintier and gayer and subtler and more elegant tongues.
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xiiout the idea of political liberty, which is the animus of all liberty, it has attracted the terms of daintier and gayer and subtler and more elegant tongues.
It is the powerful language of resistance . . .
it is the dialect of common sense.
It is the speech of the proud and melancholy races and of all who
aspire.
It is the chosen tongue to express growth faith self-esteem
freedom justice equality friendliness amplitude prudence decision and
courage.
It is the medium that shall well nigh express the
inexpressible.
No great literature nor any like style of behaviour or oratory or
social intercourse or household arrangements or public institutions or the
treatment by bosses of employed people, nor executive detail or detail of the army
or navy, nor spirit of legislation or courts or police or tuition or architecture
or songs or amusements or the costumes of young men, can long elude the jealous
and passionate instinct of American standards.
Whether or no the sign appears from the mouths of the people, it
throbs a live interrogation in every freeman's and freewoman's heart after that
which passes by or this built to remain.
Is it uniform with my country? Are its disposals without
ignominious distinctions? Is it for the evergrowing communes of brothers and
lovers, large, well-united, proud beyond the old models, generous beyond all
models?
Is it something grown fresh out of the fields or drawn from the
sea for use to me today here?
I know that what answers for me an American must answer for any
individual or nation that serves for a part of my materials.
Does this answer? or is it without reference to universal
needs?
or sprung of the needs of the less developed society of special
ranks?
or old needs of pleasure overlaid by modern science and
forms?
Does this acknowledge liberty with audible and absolute
acknowledgement, and set slavery at nought for life and death?
Will it help breed one goodshaped and wellhung man, and a woman
to be his perfect and independent mate?
Does it improve manners?
Is it for the nursing of the young of the republic?
Does it solve readily with the sweet milk of the nipples of the
breasts of the mother of many children?
Has it too the old ever-fresh forbearance and impartiality?
Does it look with the same love on the last born and on those
hardening toward stature, and on the errant, and on those who disdain all strength
of assault outside of their own?
The poems distilled from other poems will probably pass
away.
The coward will surely pass away.
The expectation of the vital and great can only be satisfied by
the demeanor of the vital and great.
The swarms of the polished deprecating and reflectors and the
polite float off and leave no remembrance.
America prepares with composure and goodwill for the visitors
that have sent word.
It is not intellect that is to be their warrant and
welcome.
The talented, the artist, the ingenious, the editor, the
statesman, the erudite . . they are not unappreciated . . they fall in their place
and do their work.
The soul of the nation also does its work.
No disguise can pass on it . . no disguise can conceal from
it.
It rejects none, it permits all.
Only toward as good as itself and toward the like of itself will
it advance half-way.
An individual is as superb as a nation when he has the qualities
which make a superb nation.
The soul of the largest and wealthiest and proudest nation may
well go half-way to meet that of its poets.
The signs are effectual.
There is no fear of mistake.
If the one is true the other is true.
The proof of a poet is that his country absorbs him as
affectionately as he has absorbed it.
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Related Manuscripts
"Leaves of Grass" [1]
("Song of Myself")
"Leaves of Grass" [1]
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Leaves of Grass.
—————
0
I CELEBRATE myself,
1
And what I assume you shall assume,
2
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
3
I loafe and invite my soul,
4
I lean and loafe at my ease . . . . observing a spear of summer grass.
5
Houses and rooms are full of perfumes . . . . the shelves are crowded with perfumes,
6
I breathe the fragrance myself, and know it and like it,
7
The distillation would intoxicate me also, but I shall not let it.
8
The atmosphere is not a perfume . . . . it has no taste of the distillation . . . . it is
odorless,
odorless,
9
It is for my mouth forever . . . . I am in love with it,
10
I will go to the bank by the wood and become undisguised and naked,
11
I am mad for it to be in contact with me.
12
The smoke of my own breath,
13
Echos, ripples, and buzzed whispers . . . . loveroot, silkthread, crotch and vine,
14
My respiration and inspiration . . . . the beating of my heart . . . . the passing of blood
and air through my lungs,
and air through my lungs,
15
The sniff of green leaves and dry leaves, and of the shore and darkcolored sea-
rocks, and of hay in the barn,
rocks, and of hay in the barn,
16
The sound of the belched words of my voice . . . . words loosed to the eddies of
the wind,
the wind,
17
A few light kisses . . . . a few embraces . . . . a reaching around of arms,
18
The play of shine and shade on the trees as the supple boughs wag,
19
The delight alone or in the rush of the streets, or along the fields and hillsides,
20
The feeling of health . . . . the full-noon trill . . . . the song of me rising from bed
and meeting the sun.
and meeting the sun.
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14 Leaves of Grass.
21
Have you reckoned a thousand acres much? Have you reckoned the earth much?
22
Have you practiced so long to learn to read?
23
Have you felt so proud to get at the meaning of poems?
24
Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of all poems,
25
You shall possess the good of the earth and sun . . . . there are millions of suns left,
26
You shall no longer take things at second or third hand . . . . nor look through the
eyes of the dead . . . . nor feed on the spectres in books,
eyes of the dead . . . . nor feed on the spectres in books,
27
You shall not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me,
28
You shall listen to all sides and filter them from yourself.
29
I have heard what the talkers were talking . . . . the talk of the beginning and the end,
30
But I do not talk of the beginning or the end.
31
There was never any more inception than there is now,
32
Nor any more youth or age than there is now;
33
And will never be any more perfection than there is now,
34
Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now.
35
Urge and urge and urge,
36
Always the procreant urge of the world.
37
Out of the dimness opposite equals advance . . . . Always substance and increase,
38
Always a knit of identity . . . . always distinction . . . . always a breed of life.
39
To elaborate is no avail . . . . Learned and unlearned feel that it is so.
40
Sure as the most certain sure . . . . plumb in the uprights, well entretied, braced in
the beams,
the beams,
41
Stout as a horse, affectionate, haughty, electrical,
42
I and this mystery here we stand.
43
Clear and sweet is my soul . . . . and clear and sweet is all that is not my soul.
44
Lack one lacks both . . . . and the unseen is proved by the seen,
45
Till that becomes unseen and receives proof in its turn.
46
Showing the best and dividing it from the worst, age vexes age,
47
Knowing the perfect fitness and equanimity of things, while they discuss I am silent,
and go bathe and admire myself.
and go bathe and admire myself.
48
Welcome is every organ and attribute of me, and of any man hearty and clean,
49
Not an inch nor a particle of an inch is vile, and none shall be less familiar than the rest.
50
I am satisfied . . . . I see, dance, laugh, sing;
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of Grass. 15
51
As God comes a loving bedfellow and sleeps at my side all night and close on the
peep of the day,
peep of the day,
52
And leaves for me baskets covered with white towels bulging the house with their
plenty,
plenty,
53
Shall I postpone my acceptation and realization and scream at my eyes,
54
That they turn from gazing after and down the road,
55
And forthwith cipher and show me to a cent,
56
Exactly the contents of one, and exactly the contents of two, and which is ahead?
57
Trippers and askers surround me,
58
People I meet . . . . . the effect upon me of my early life . . . . of the
live in . . . . of the nation,
live in . . . . of the nation,
59
The latest news . . . . discoveries, inventions, societies . . . . authors old and new,
60
My dinner, dress, associates, looks, business, compliments, dues,
61
The real or fancied indifference of some man or woman I love,
62
The sickness of one of my folks—or of myself . . . . or ill-doing . . . . or loss or lack
of money . . . . or depressions or exaltations,
of money . . . . or depressions or exaltations,
63
They come to me days and nights and go from me again,
64
But they are not the Me myself.
65
Apart from the pulling and hauling stands what I am,
66
Stands amused, complacent, compassionating, idle, unitary,
67
Looks down, is erect, bends an arm on an impalpable certain rest,
68
Looks with its sidecurved head curious what will come next,
69
Both in and out of the game, and watching and wondering at it.
70
Backward I see in my own days where I sweated through fog with linguists and
contenders,
contenders,
71
I have no mockings or arguments . . . . I witness and wait.
72
I believe in you my soul . . . . the other I am must not abase itself to you,
73
And you must not be abased to the other.
74
Loafe with me on the grass . . . . loose the stop from your throat,
75
Not words, not music or rhyme I want . . . . not custom or lecture, not even the best,
76
Only the lull I like, the hum of your valved voice.
77
I mind how we lay in June, such a transparent summer morning;
78
You settled your head athwart my hips and gently turned over upon me,
79
And parted the shirt from my bosom-bone, and plunged your tongue to my barestript
heart,
heart,
80
And reached till you felt my beard, and reached till you held my feet.
81
Swiftly arose and spread around me the peace and joy and knowledge that pass all
the art and argument of the earth;
the art and argument of the earth;
82
And I know that the hand of God is the elderhand of my own,
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16 Leaves of Grass,
83
And I know that the spirit of God is the eldest brother of my own,
84
And that all the men ever born are also my brothers . . . . and the women my sisters
and lovers,
and lovers,
85
And that a kelson of the creation is love;
86
And limitless are leaves stiff or drooping in the fields,
87
And brown ants in the little wells beneath them,
88
And mossy scabs of the wormfence, and heaped stones, and elder and mullen and
pokeweed.
pokeweed.
89
A child said, What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands;
90
How could I answer the child? . . . . I do not know what it is any more than he.
91
I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green stuff woven.
92
Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,
93
A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropped,
94
Bearing the owner's name someway in the corners, that we may see and remark,
and say Whose?
and say Whose?
95
Or I guess the grass is itself a child . . . . the produced babe of the vegetation.
96
Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic,
97
And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow zones,
98
Growing among black folks as among white,
99
Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the same, I receive them the
same.
same.
100
And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves.
101
Tenderly will I use you curling grass,
102
It may be you transpire from the breasts of young men,
103
It may be if I had known them I would have loved them;
104
It may be you are from old people and from women, and from offspring taken soon
out of their mothers' laps,
out of their mothers' laps,
105
And here you are the mothers' laps.
106
This grass is very dark to be from the white heads of old mothers,
107
Darker than the colorless beards of old men,
108
Dark to come from under the faint red roofs of mouths.
109
O I perceive after all so many uttering tongues!
110
And I perceive they do not come from the roofs of mouths for nothing.
111
I wish I could translate the hints about the dead young men and women,
112
And the hints about old men and mothers, and the offspring taken soon out of their
laps.
laps.
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Leaves of Grass. 17
113
What do you think has become of the young and old men?
114
And what do you think has become of the women and children?
115
They are alive and well somewhere;
116
The smallest sprout shows there is really no death,
117
And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the end to arrest it,
118
And ceased the moment life appeared.
119
All goes onward and outward . . . . and nothing collapses,
120
And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.
121
Has any one supposed it lucky to be born?
122
I hasten to inform him or her it is just as lucky to die, and I know it.
123
I pass death with the dying, and birth with the new-washed babe . . . . and am not
contained between my hat and boots,
contained between my hat and boots,
124
And peruse manifold objects, no two alike, and every one good,
125
The earth good, and the stars good, and their adjuncts all good.
126
I am not an earth nor an adjunct of an earth,
127
I am the mate and companion of people, all just as immortal and fathomless as
myself;
myself;
128
They do not know how immortal, but I know.
129
Every kind for itself and its own . . . . for me mine male and female,
130
For me all that have been boys and that love women,
131
For me the man that is proud and feels how it stings to be slighted,
132
For me the sweetheart and the old maid . . . . for me mothers and the mothers of
mothers,
mothers,
133
For me lips that have smiled, eyes that have shed tears,
134
For me children and the begetters of children.
135
Who need be afraid of the merge?
136
Undrape . . . . you are not guilty to me, nor stale nor discarded,
137
I see through the broadcloth and gingham whether or no,
138
And am around, tenacious, acquisitive, tireless . . . . and can never be shaken away.
139
The little one sleeps in its cradle,
140
I lift the gauze and look a long time, and silently brush away flies with my hand.
141
The youngster and the redfaced girl turn aside up the bushy hill,
142
I peeringly view them from the top.
143
The suicide sprawls on the bloody floor of the bedroom,
144
It is so . . . . I witnessed the corpse . . . . there the pistol had fallen.
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18 Leaves of Grass.
145
The blab of the pave . . . . the tires of carts and sluff of bootsoles and talk of the
promenaders,
promenaders,
146
The heavy omnibus, the driver with his interrogating thumb, the clank of the shod
horses on the granite floor,
horses on the granite floor,
147
The carnival of sleighs, the clinking and shouted jokes and pelts of snowballs;
148
The hurrahs for popular favorites . . . . the fury of roused mobs,
149
The flap of the curtained litter—the sick man inside, borne to the hospital,
150
The meeting of enemies, the sudden oath, the blows and fall,
151
The excited crowd—the policeman with his star quickly working his passage to the
centre of the crowd;
centre of the crowd;
152
The impassive stones that receive and return so many echoes,
153
The souls moving along . . . . are they invisible while the least atom of the stones is
visible?
visible?
154
What groans of overfed or half-starved who fall on the flags sunstruck or in fits,
155
What exclamations of women taken suddenly, who hurry home and give birth to
babes,
babes,
156
What living and buried speech is always vibrating here . . . . what howls restrained
by decorum,
by decorum,
157
Arrests of criminals, slights, adulterous offers made, acceptances, rejections with
convex lips,
convex lips,
158
I mind them or the resonance of them . . . . I come again and again.
159
The big doors of the country-barn stand open and ready
160
The dried grass of the harvest-time loads the slow-drawn wagon,
161
The clear light plays on the brown gray and green intertinged,
162
The armfuls are packed to the sagging mow:
163
I am there . . . . I help . . . . I came stretched atop of the load,
164
I felt its soft jolts . . . . one leg reclined on the other,
165
I jump from the crossbeams, and seize the clover and timothy,
166
And roll head over heels, and tangle my hair full of wisps.
167
Alone far in the wilds and mountains I hunt,
168
Wandering amazed at my own lightness and glee,
169
In the late afternoon choosing a safe spot to pass the night,
170
Kindling a fire and broiling the freshkilled game,
171
Soundly falling asleep on the gathered leaves, my dog and gun by my side.
172
The Yankee clipper is under her three skysails . . . . she cuts the sparkle and scud,
173
My eyes settle the land . . . . I bend at her prow or shout joyously from the deck.
174
The boatmen and clamdiggers arose early and stopped for me,
175
I tucked my trowser-ends in my boots and went and had a good time,
176
You should have been with us that day round the chowder-kettle.
177
I saw the marriage of the trapper in the open air in the far-west . . . . the bride was
a red girl,
a red girl,
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Leaves of Grass. 19
178
Her father and his friends sat near by crosslegged and dumbly smoking . . . . they
had moccasins to their feet and large thick blankets hanging from their
shoulders;
had moccasins to their feet and large thick blankets hanging from their
shoulders;
179
On a bank lounged the trapper . . . . he was dressed mostly in skins . . . . his luxuriant
beard and curls protected his neck,
beard and curls protected his neck,
180
One hand rested on his rifle . . . . the other hand held firmly the wrist of the red girl,
181
She had long eyelashes . . . . her head was bare . . . . her coarse straight locks
descended upon her voluptuous limbs and reached to her feet.
descended upon her voluptuous limbs and reached to her feet.
182
The runaway slave came to my house and stopped outside,
183
I heard his motions crackling the twigs of the woodpile,
184
Through the swung half-door of the kitchen I saw him limpsey and weak,
185
And went where he sat on a log, and led him in and assured him,
186
And brought water and filled a tub for his sweated body and bruised feet,
187
And gave him a room that entered from my own, and gave him some coarse clean
clothes,
clothes,
188
And remember perfectly well his revolving eyes and his awkwardness,
189
And remember putting plasters on the galls of his neck and ankles;
190
He staid with me a week before he was recuperated and passed north,
191
I had him sit next me at table . . . . my firelock leaned in the corner.
192
Twenty-eight young men bathe by the shore,
193
Twenty-eight young men, and all so friendly,
194
Twenty-eight years of womanly life, and all so lonesome.
195
She owns the fine house by the rise of the bank,
196
She hides handsome and richly drest aft the blinds of the window.
197
Which of the young men does she like the best?
198
Ah the homeliest of them is beautiful to her.
199
Where are you off to, lady? for I see you,
200
You splash in the water there, yet stay stock still in your room.
201
Dancing and laughing along the beach came the twenty-ninth bather,
202
The rest did not see her, but she saw them and loved them.
203
The beards of the young men glistened with wet, it ran from their long hair,
204
Little streams passed all over their bodies.
205
An unseen hand also passed over their bodies,
206
It descended tremblingly from their temples and ribs.
207
The young men float on their backs, their white bellies swell to the sun . . . . they do
not ask who seizes fast to them,
not ask who seizes fast to them,
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20 Leaves of Grass.
208
They do not know who puffs and declines with pendant and bending arch,
209
They do not think whom they souse with spray.
210
The butcher-boy puts off his killing-clothes, or sharpens his knife at the stall in the
market,
market,
211
I loiter enjoying his repartee and his shuffle and breakdown.
212
Blacksmiths with grimed and hairy chests environ the anvil,
213
Each has his main-sledge . . . . they are all out . . . . there is a great heat in the fire.
214
From the cinder-strewed threshold I follow their movements,
215
The lithe sheer of their waists plays even with their massive arms,
216
Overhand the hammers roll—overhand so slow—overhand so sure,
217
They do not hasten, each man hits in his place.
218
The negro holds firmly the reins of his four horses . . . . the block swags underneath
on its tied-over chain,
on its tied-over chain,
219
The negro that drives the huge dray of the stoneyard . . . . steady and tall he stands
poised on one leg on the stringpiece,
poised on one leg on the stringpiece,
220
His blue shirt exposes his ample neck and breast and loosens over his hipband,
221
His glance is calm and commanding . . . . he tosses the slouch of his hat away from
his forehead,
his forehead,
222
The sun falls on his crispy hair and moustache . . . . falls on the black of his polish'd
and perfect limbs.
and perfect limbs.
223
I behold the picturesque giant and love him . . . . and I do not stop there,
224
I go with the team also.
225
In me the caresser of life wherever moving . . . . backward as well as forward slue-
ing,
ing,
226
To niches aside and junior bending.
227
Oxen that rattle the yoke or halt in the shade, what is that you express in your eyes?
228
It seems to me more than all the print I have read in my life.
229
My tread scares the wood-drake and wood-duck on my distant and daylong ramble,
230
They rise together, they slowly circle around.
231
. . . . I believe in those winged purposes,
232
And acknowledge the red yellow and white playing within me,
233
And consider the green and violet and the tufted crown intentional;
234
And do not call the tortoise unworthy because she is not something else,
235
And the mockingbird in the swamp never studied the gamut, yet trills pretty well to
me,
me,
236
And the look of the bay mare shames silliness out of me.
237
The wild gander leads his flock through the cool night,
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Leaves of Grass. 21
238
Ya-honk! he says, and sounds it down to me like an invitation;
239
The pert may suppose it meaningless, but I listen closer,
240
I find its purpose and place up there toward the November sky.
241
The sharphoofed moose of the north, the cat on the housesill, the chickadee, the
prairie-dog,
prairie-dog,
242
The litter of the grunting sow as they tug at her teats,
243
The brood of the turkeyhen, and she with her halfspread wings,
244
I see in them and myself the same old law.
245
The press of my foot to the earth springs a hundred affections,
246
They scorn the best I can do to relate them.
247
I am enamoured of growing outdoors,
248
Of men that live among cattle or taste of the ocean or woods,
249
Of the builders and steerers of ships, of the wielders of axes and mauls, of the drivers
of horses,
of horses,
250
I can eat and sleep with them week in and week out.
251
What is commonest and cheapest and nearest and easiest is Me,
252
Me going in for my chances, spending for vast returns,
253
Adorning myself to bestow myself on the first that will take me,
254
Not asking the sky to come down to my goodwill,
255
Scattering it freely forever.
256
The pure contralto sings in the organloft,
257
The carpenter dresses his plank . . . . the tongue of his foreplane whistles its wild
ascending lisp,
ascending lisp,
258
The married and unmarried children ride home to their thanksgiving dinner,
259
The pilot seizes the king-pin, he heaves down with a strong arm,
260
The mate stands braced in the whaleboat, lance and harpoon are ready,
261
The duck-shooter walks by silent and cautious stretches,
262
The deacons are ordained with crossed hands at the altar,
263
The spinning-girl retreats and advances to the hum of the big wheel,
264
The farmer stops by the bars of a Sunday and looks at the oats and rye,
265
The lunatic is carried at last to the asylum a confirmed case,
266
He will never sleep any more as he did in the cot in his mother's bedroom;
267
The jour printer with gray head and gaunt jaws works at his case,
268
He turns his quid of tobacco, his eyes get blurred with the manuscript;
269
The malformed limbs are tied to the anatomist's table,
270
What is removed drops horribly in a pail;
271
The quadroon girl is sold at the stand . . . . the drunkard nods by the barroom stove,
272
The machinist rolls up his sleeves . . . . the policeman travels his beat . . . . the gate-
keeper marks who pass,
keeper marks who pass,
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22 Leaves of Grass.
273
The young fellow drives the express-wagon . . . . I love him though I do not know
him;
him;
274
The half-breed straps on his light boots to compete in the race,
275
The western turkey-shooting draws old and young . . . . some lean on their rifles,
some sit on logs,
some sit on logs,
276
Out from the crowd steps the marksman and takes his position and levels his piece;
277
The groups of newly-come immigrants cover the wharf or levee,
278
The woollypates hoe in the sugarfield, the overseer views them from his saddle;
279
The bugle calls in the ballroom, the gentlemen run for their partners, the dancers
bow to each other;
bow to each other;
280
The youth lies awake in the cedar-roofed garret and harks to the musical rain,
281
The Wolverine sets traps on the creek that helps fill the Huron,
282
The reformer ascends the platform, he spouts with his mouth and nose,
283
The company returns from its excursion, the darkey brings up the rear and bears the
well-riddled target,
well-riddled target,
284
The squaw wrapt in her yellow-hemmed cloth is offering moccasins and beadbags for
sale,
sale,
285
The connoisseur peers along the exhibition-gallery with halfshut eyes bent sideways,
286
The deckhands make fast the steamboat, the plank is thrown for the shoregoing
passengers,
passengers,
287
The young sister holds out the skein, the elder sister winds it off in a ball and stops
now and then for the knots,
now and then for the knots,
288
The one-year wife is recovering and happy, a week ago she bore her first child,
289
The cleanhaired Yankee girl works with her sewing-machine or in the factory or
mill,
mill,
290
The nine months' gone is in the parturition chamber, her faintness and pains are ad-
vancing;
vancing;
291
The pavingman leans on his twohanded rammer—the reporter's lead flies swiftly
over the notebook—the signpainter is lettering with red and gold,
over the notebook—the signpainter is lettering with red and gold,
292
The canal-boy trots on the towpath—the bookkeeper counts at his desk—the
shoemaker waxes his thread,
shoemaker waxes his thread,
293
The conductor beats time for the band and all the performers follow him,
294
The child is baptised—the convert is making the first professions,
295
The regatta is spread on the bay . . . . how the white sails sparkle!
296
The drover watches his drove, he sings out to them that would stray,
297
The pedlar sweats with his pack on his back—the purchaser higgles about the odd
cent,
cent,
298
The camera and plate are prepared, the lady must sit for her daguerreotype,
299
The bride unrumples her white dress, the minutehand of the clock moves slowly,
300
The opium eater reclines with rigid head and just-opened lips,
301
The prostitute draggles her shawl, her bonnet bobs on her tipsy and pimpled neck,
302
The crowd laugh at her blackguard oaths, the men jeer and wink to each other,
303
(Miserable! I do not laugh at your oaths nor jeer you,)
304
The President holds a cabinet council, he is surrounded by the great secretaries,
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Leaves of Grass. 23
305
On the piazza walk five friendly matrons with twined arms;
306
The crew of the fish-smack pack repeated layers of halibut in the hold,
307
The Missourian crosses the plains toting his wares and his cattle,
308
The fare-collector goes through the train—he gives notice by the jingling of loose
change,
change,
309
The floormen are laying the floor—the tinners are tinning the roof—the masons
are calling for mortar,
are calling for mortar,
310
In single file each shouldering his hod pass onward the laborers;
311
Seasons pursuing each other the indescribable crowd is gathered . . . . it is the
Fourth of July . . . . what salutes of cannon and small arms!
Fourth of July . . . . what salutes of cannon and small arms!
312
Seasons pursuing each other the plougher ploughs and the mower mows and the
wintergrain falls in the ground;
wintergrain falls in the ground;
313
Off on the lakes the pikefisher watches and waits by the hole in the frozen surface,
314
The stumps stand thick round the clearing, the
squatter strikes deep with his axe,
315
The flatboatmen make fast toward dusk near the cottonwood or pekantrees,
316
The coon-seekers go now through the regions of the Red river, or through those
drained by the Tennessee, or through those of the Arkansas,
drained by the Tennessee, or through those of the Arkansas,
317
The torches shine in the dark that hangs on the Chattahoochee or Altamahaw;
318
Patriarchs sit at supper with sons and grandsons and great grandsons around them,
319
In walls of
, in canvass tents, rest hunters and trappers after their day's sport.
320
The city sleeps and the country sleeps,
321
The living sleep for their time . . . . the dead sleep for their time,
322
The old husband sleeps by his wife and the young husband sleeps by his wife;
323
And these one and all tend inward to me, and I tend outward to them,
324
And such as it is to be of these more or less I am.
325
I am of old and young, of the foolish as much as the wise,
326
Regardless of others, ever regardful of others,
327
Maternal as well as paternal, a child as well as a man,
328
Stuffed with the stuff that is coarse, and stuffed with the stuff that is fine,
329
One of the great nation, the nation of many nations—the smallest the same and the
largest the same,
largest the same,
330
A southerner soon as a northerner, a planter nonchalant and hospitable,
331
A Yankee bound my own way . . . . ready for trade . . . . my joints the limberest
joints on earth and the sternest joints on earth,
joints on earth and the sternest joints on earth,
332
A Kentuckian walking the vale of the Elkhorn in my deerskin leggings,
333
A boatman over the lakes or bays or along coasts . . . . a Hoosier, a Badger, a
Buckeye,
Buckeye,
334
A Louisianian or Georgian, a poke-easy from sandhills and pines,
335
At home on Canadian snowshoes or up in the bush, or with fishermen off New-
foundland,
foundland,
336
At home in the fleet of iceboats, sailing with the rest and tacking,
337
At home on the hills of Vermont or in the woods of Maine or the Texan ranch,
338
Comrade of Californians . . . . comrade of free northwesterners, loving their big
proportions,
proportions,
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24 Leaves of Grass,
339
Comrade of raftsmen and coalmen—comrade of all who shake hands and welcome
to drink and meat;
to drink and meat;
340
A learner with the simplest, a teacher of the thoughtfulest,
341
A novice beginning experient of myriads of seasons,
342
Of every hue and trade and rank, of every caste and religion,
343
Not merely of the New World but of Africa Europe or Asia . . . . a wandering
savage,
savage,
344
A farmer, mechanic, or artist . . . . a gentleman, sailor, lover or quaker,
345
A prisoner, fancy-man, rowdy, lawyer, physician or priest.
346
I resist anything better than my own diversity,
347
And breathe the air and leave plenty after me,
348
And am not stuck up, and am in my place.
349
The moth and the fisheggs are in their place,
350
The suns I see and the suns I cannot see are in their place,
351
The palpable is in its place and the impalpable is in its place.
352
These are the thoughts of all men in all ages and lands, they are not original with
me,
me,
353
If they are not yours as much as mine they are nothing or next to nothing,
354
If they do not enclose everything they are next to nothing,
355
If they are not the riddle and the untying of the riddle they are nothing,
356
If they are not just as close as they are distant they are nothing.
357
This is the grass that grows wherever the land is and the water is,
358
This is the common air that bathes the globe.
359
This is the breath of laws and songs and behaviour,
360
This is the the tasteless water of souls . . . . this is the true sustenance,
361
It is for the illiterate . . . . it is for the judges of the supreme court . . . . it is for the
federal capitol and the state capitols,
federal capitol and the state capitols,
362
It is for the admirable communes of literary men and composers and singers and
lecturers and engineers and savans,
lecturers and engineers and savans,
363
It is for the endless races of working people and farmers and seamen.
364
This is the trill of a thousand clear cornets and scream of the octave flute and strike
of triangles.
of triangles.
365
I play not a march for victors only . . . . I play great marches for conquered and
slain persons.
slain persons.
366
Have you heard that it was good to gain the day?
367
I also say it is good to fall . . . . battles are lost in the same spirit in which they are
won.
won.
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Leaves of Grass. 25
368
I sound triumphal drums for the dead . . . . I fling through my embouchures the
loudest and gayest music to them,
loudest and gayest music to them,
369
Vivas to those who have failed, and to those whose war-vessels sank in the sea,
and those themselves who sank in the sea,
and those themselves who sank in the sea,
370
And to all generals that lost engagements, and all overcome heroes, and the number-
less unknown heroes equal to the greatest heroes known.
less unknown heroes equal to the greatest heroes known.
371
This is the meal pleasantly set . . . . this is the meat and drink for natural hunger,
372
It is for the wicked just the same as the righteous . . . . I make appointments with all,
373
I will not have a single person slighted or left away,
374
The keptwoman and sponger and thief are hereby invited . . . . the heavy-lipped slave
is invited . . . . the venerealee is invited,
is invited . . . . the venerealee is invited,
375
There shall be no difference between them and the rest.
376
This is the press of a bashful hand . . . . this is the float and odor of hair,
377
This is the touch of my lips to yours . . . . this is the murmur of yearning,
378
This is the far-off depth and height reflecting my own face,
379
This is the thoughtful merge of myself and the outlet again.
380
Do you guess I have some intricate purpose?
381
Well I have . . . . for the April rain has, and the mica on the side of a rock has.
382
Do you take it I would astonish?
383
Does the daylight astonish? or the early redstart twittering through the woods?
384
Do I astonish more than they?
385
This hour I tell things in confidence,
386
I might not tell everybody but I will tell you.
387
Who goes there! hankering, gross, mystical, nude?
388
How is it I extract strength from the beef I eat?
389
What is a man anyhow? What am I? and what are you?
390
All I mark as my own you shall offset it with your own,
391
Else it were time lost listening to me.
392
I do not snivel that snivel the world over,
393
That months are vacuums and the ground but wallow and filth,
394
That life is a suck and a sell, and nothing remains at the end but threadbare crape
and tears.
and tears.
395
Whimpering and truckling fold with powders for invalids . . . . conformity goes to
the fourth-removed,
the fourth-removed,
396
I cock my hat as I please indoors or out.
397
Shall I pray? Shall I venerate and be ceremonious?
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26 Leaves of Grass.
398
I have pried through the strata and analyzed to a hair,
399
And counselled with doctors and calculated close and found no sweeter fat than
sticks to my own bones.
sticks to my own bones.
400
In all people I see myself, none more and not one a barleycorn less,
401
And the good or bad I say of myself I say of them.
402
And I know I am solid and sound,
403
To me the converging objects of the universe perpetually flow,
404
All are written to me, and I must get what the writing means.
405
And I know I am deathless,
406
I know this orbit of mine cannot be swept by a carpenter's compass,
407
I know I shall not pass like a child's carlacue cut with a burnt stick at night.
408
I know I am august,
409
I do not trouble my spirit to vindicate itself or be understood,
410
I see that the elementary laws never apologize,
411
I reckon I behave no prouder than the level I plant my house by after all.
412
I exist as I am, that is enough,
413
If no other in the world be aware I sit content,
414
And if each and all be aware I sit content.
415
One world is aware, and by far the largest to me, and that is myself,
416
And whether I come to my own today or in ten thousand or ten million years,
417
I can cheerfully take it now, or with equal cheerfulness I can wait.
418
My foothold is tenoned and mortised in granite,
419
I laugh at what you call dissolution,
420
And I know the amplitude of time.
421
I am the poet of the body,
422
And I am the poet of the soul.
423
The pleasures of heaven are with me, and the pains of hell are with me,
424
The first I graft and increase upon myself . . . . the latter I translate into a new
tongue.
tongue.
425
I am the poet of the woman the same as the man,
426
And I say it is as great to be a woman as to be a man,
427
And I say there is nothing greater than the mother of men.
428
I chant a new chant of dilation or pride,
429
We have had ducking and deprecating about enough,
430
I show that size is only developement.
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Leaves of Grass. 27
431
Have you outstript the rest? Are you the President?
432
It is a trifle . . . . they will more than arrive there every one, and still pass on.
433
I am he that walks with the tender and growing night;
434
I call to the earth and sea half-held by the night.
435
Press close barebosomed night! Press close magnetic nourishing night!
436
Night of south winds! Night of the large few stars!
437
Still nodding night! Mad naked summer night!
438
Smile O voluptuous coolbreathed earth!
439
Earth of the slumbering and liquid trees!
440
Earth of departed sunset! Earth of the mountains misty-topt!
441
Earth of the vitreous pour of the full moon just tinged with blue!
442
Earth of shine and dark mottling the tide of the river!
443
Earth of the limpid gray of clouds brighter and clearer for my sake!
444
Far-swooping elbowed earth! Rich apple-blossomed earth!
445
Smile, for your lover comes!
446
Prodigal! you have given me love! . . . . therefore I to you give love!
447
O unspeakable passionate love!
448
Thruster holding me tight and that I hold tight!
449
We hurt each other as the bridegroom and the bride hurt each other.
450
You sea! I resign myself to you also . . . . I guess what you mean,
451
I behold from the beach your crooked inviting fingers,
452
I believe you refuse to go back without feeling of me;
453
We must have a turn together . . . . I undress . . . . hurry me out of sight of the land,
454
Cushion me soft . . . . rock me in billowy drowse,
455
Dash me with amorous wet . . . . I can repay you.
456
Sea of stretched ground-swells!
457
Sea breathing broad and convulsive breaths!
458
Sea of the brine of life! Sea of unshovelled and always-ready graves!
459
Howler and scooper of storms! Capricious and dainty sea!
460
I am integral with you . . . . I too am of one phase and of all phases.
461
Partaker of influx and efflux . . . . extoler of hate and conciliation,
462
Extoler of amies and those that sleep in each others' arms.
463
I am he attesting sympathy;
464
Shall I make my list of things in the house and skip the house that supports them?
465
I am the poet of commonsense and of the demonstrable and of immortality;
466
And am not the poet of goodness only . . . . I do not decline to be the poet of wick-
edness also.
edness also.
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28 Leaves of Grass.
467
Washes and razors for foofoos . . . . for me freckles and a bristling beard.
468
What blurt is it about virtue and about vice?
469
Evil propels me, and reform of evil propels me . . . . I stand indifferent,
470
My gait is no faultfinder's or rejecter's gait,
471
I moisten the roots of all that has grown.
472
Did you fear some scrofula out of the unflagging pregnancy?
473
Did you guess the celestial laws are yet to be worked over and rectified?
474
I step up to say that what we do is right and what we affirm is right . . . . and some
is only the ore of right,
is only the ore of right,
475
Witnesses of us . . . . one side a balance and the antipodal side a balance,
476
Soft doctrine as steady help as stable doctrine,
477
Thoughts and deeds of the present our rouse and early start.
478
This minute that comes to me over the past decillions,
479
There is no better than it and now.
480
What behaved well in the past or behaves well today is not such a wonder,
481
The wonder is always and always how there can be a mean man or an infidel.
482
Endless unfolding of words of ages!
483
And mine a word of the modern . . . . a word en masse.
484
A word of the faith that never balks,
485
One time as good as another time . . . . here or henceforward it is all the same to
me.
me.
486
A word of reality . . . . materialism first and last imbueing.
487
Hurrah for positive science! Long live exact demonstration!
488
Fetch stonecrop and mix it with cedar and branches of lilac;
489
This is the lexicographer or chemist . . . . this made a grammar of the old
cartouches,
cartouches,
490
These mariners put the ship through dangerous unknown seas,
491
This is the geologist, and this works with the scalpel, and this is a mathematician.
492
Gentlemen I receive you, and attach and clasp hands with you,
493
The facts are useful and real . . . . they are not my dwelling . . . . I enter by them to
an area of the dwelling.
an area of the dwelling.
494
I am less the reminder of property or qualities, and more the reminder of life,
495
And go on the square for my own sake and for others' sakes,
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Leaves of Grass. 29
496
And make short account of neuters and geldings, and favor men and women fully
equipped,
equipped,
497
And beat the gong of revolt, and stop with fugitives and them that plot and conspire.
498
Walt Whitman, an American, one of the roughs, a kosmos,
499
Disorderly fleshy and sensual . . . . eating drinking and breeding,
500
No sentimentalist . . . . no stander above men and women or apart from them . . . . no
more modest than immodest.
more modest than immodest.
501
Unscrew the locks from the doors!
502
Unscrew the doors themselves from their jambs!
503
Whoever degrades another degrades me . . . . and whatever is done or said returns
at last to me,
at last to me,
504
And whatever I do or say I also return.
505
Through me the afflatus surging and surging . . . . through me the current and index.
506
I speak the password primeval . . . . I give the sign of democracy;
507
By God! I will accept nothing which all cannot have their counterpart of on the
same terms.
same terms.
508
Through me many long dumb voices,
509
Voices of the interminable generations of slaves,
510
Voices of prostitutes and of deformed persons,
511
Voices of the diseased and despairing, and of thieves and dwarfs,
512
Voices of cycles of preparation and accretion,
513
And of the threads that connect the stars—and of wombs, and of the fatherstuff,
514
And of the rights of them the others are down upon,
515
Of the trivial and flat and foolish and despised,
516
Of fog in the air and beetles rolling balls of dung.
517
Through me forbidden voices,
518
Voices of sexes and lusts . . . . voices veiled, and I remove the veil,
519
Voices indecent by me clarified and transfigured.
520
I do not press my finger across my mouth,
521
I keep as delicate around the bowels as around the head and heart,
522
Copulation is no more rank to me than death is.
523
I believe in the flesh and the appetites,
524
Seeing hearing and feeling are miracles, and each part and tag of me is a miracle.
525
Divine am I inside and out, and I make holy whatever I touch or am touched from;
526
The scent of these arm-pits is aroma finer than prayer,
527
This head is more than churches or bibles or creeds.
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30 Leaves of Grass.
528
If I worship any particular thing it shall be some of the spread of my body;
529
Translucent mould of me it shall be you,
530
Shaded ledges and rests, firm masculine coulter, it shall be you,
531
Whatever goes to the tilth of me it shall be you,
532
You my rich blood, your milky stream pale strippings of my life;
533
Breast that presses against other breasts it shall be you,
534
My brain it shall be your occult convolutions,
535
Root of washed sweet-flag, timorous pond-snipe, nest of guarded duplicate eggs, it
shall be you,
shall be you,
536
Mixed tussled hay of head and beard and brawn it shall be you,
537
Trickling sap of maple, fibre of manly wheat, it shall be you;
538
Sun so generous it shall be you,
539
Vapors lighting and shading my face it shall be you,
540
You sweaty brooks and dews it shall be you,
541
Winds whose soft-tickling genitals rub against me it shall be you,
542
Broad muscular fields, branches of liveoak, loving lounger in my winding paths, it
shall be you,
shall be you,
543
Hands I have taken, face I have kissed, mortal I have ever touched, it shall be you.
544
I dote on myself . . . . there is that lot of me, and all so luscious,
545
Each moment and whatever happens thrills me with joy.
546
I cannot tell how my ankles bend . . . . nor whence the cause of my faintest wish,
547
Nor the cause of the friendship I emit . . . . nor the cause of the friendship I take
again.
again.
548
To walk up my stoop is unaccountable . . . . I pause to consider if it really be,
549
That I eat and drink is spectacle enough for the great authors and schools,
550
A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books.
551
To behold the daybreak!
552
The little light fades the immense and diaphanous shadows,
553
The air tastes good to my palate.
554
Hefts of the moving world at innocent gambols, silently rising, freshly exuding,
555
Scooting obliquely high and low.
556
Something I cannot see puts upward libidinous prongs,
557
Seas of bright juice suffuse heaven.
558
The earth by the sky staid with . . . . the daily close of their junction,
559
The heaved challenge from the east that moment over my head,
560
The mocking taunt, See then whether you shall be master!
561
Dazzling and tremendous how quick the sunrise would kill me,
562
If I could not now and always send sunrise out of me.
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Leaves of Grass. 31
563
We also ascend dazzling and tremendous as the sun,
564
We found our own my soul in the calm and cool of the daybreak.
565
My voice goes after what my eyes cannot reach,
566
With the twirl of my tongue I encompass worlds and volumes of worlds.
567
Speech is the twin of my vision . . . . it is unequal to measure itself.
568
It provokes me forever,
569
It says sarcastically, Walt, you understand enough . . . . why don't you let it out
then?
then?
570
Come now I will not be tantalized . . . . you conceive too much of articulation.
571
Do you not know how the buds beneath are folded?
572
Waiting in gloom protected by frost,
573
The dirt receding before my prophetical screams,
574
I underlying causes to balance them at last,
575
My knowledge my live parts . . . . it keeping tally with the meaning of things,
576
Happiness . . . . which whoever hears me let him or her set out in search of this
day.
day.
577
My final merit I refuse you . . . . I refuse putting from me the best I am.
578
Encompass worlds but never try to encompass me,
579
I crowd your noisiest talk by looking toward you.
580
Writing and talk do not prove me,
581
I carry the plenum of proof and every thing else in my face,
582
With the hush of my lips I confound the topmost skeptic.
583
I think I will do nothing for a long time but listen,
584
And accrue what I hear into myself . . . . and let sounds contribute toward me.
585
I hear the bravuras of birds . . . . the bustle of growing wheat . . . . gossip of flames
. . . . clack of sticks cooking my meals.
. . . . clack of sticks cooking my meals.
586
I hear the sound of the human voice . . . . a sound I love,
587
I hear all sounds as they are tuned to their uses . . . . sounds of the city and sounds
out of the city . . . . sounds of the day and night;
out of the city . . . . sounds of the day and night;
588
Talkative young ones to those that like them . . . . the recitative of fish-pedlars and
fruit-pedlars . . . . the loud laugh of workpeople at their meals,
fruit-pedlars . . . . the loud laugh of workpeople at their meals,
589
The angry base of disjointed friendship . . . . the faint tones of the sick,
590
The judge with hands tight to the desk, his shaky lips pronouncing a death-sentence,
591
The heave'e'yo of stevedores unlading ships by the wharves . . . . the refrain of the
anchor-lifters;
anchor-lifters;
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32 Leaves of Grass.
592
The ring of alarm-bells . . . . the cry of fire . . . . the whirr of swift-streaking engines
and hose-carts with premonitory tinkles and colored lights,
and hose-carts with premonitory tinkles and colored lights,
593
The steam-whistle . . . . the solid roll of the train of approaching cars;
594
The slow-march played at night at the head of the association,
595
They go to guard some corpse . . . . the flag-tops are draped with black muslin.
596
I hear the violincello or man's heart's complaint,
597
And hear the keyed cornet or else the echo of sunset.
598
I hear the chorus . . . . it is a grand-opera . . . . this indeed is music!
599
A tenor large and fresh as the creation fills me,
600
The orbic flex of his mouth is pouring and filling me full.
601
I hear the trained soprano . . . . she convulses me like the climax of my
602
The orchestra whirls me wider than Uranus flies,
603
It wrenches unnamable ardors from my breast,
604
It throbs me to gulps of the farthest down horror,
605
It sails me . . . . I dab with bare feet . . . . they are licked by the indolent waves,
606
I am exposed . . . . cut by bitter and poisoned hail,
607
Steeped amid honeyed morphine . . . . my windpipe squeezed in the fakes of death,
608
Let up again to feel the puzzle of puzzles,
609
And that we call Being.
610
To be in any form, what is that?
611
If nothing lay more developed the quahaug and its callous shell were enough.
612
Mine is no callous shell,
613
I have instant conductors all over me whether I pass or stop,
614
They seize every object and lead it harmlessly through me.
615
I merely stir, press, feel with my fingers, and am happy,
616
To touch my person to some one else's is about as much as I can stand.
617
Is this then a touch? . . . . quivering me to a new identity,
618
Flames and ether making a rush for my veins,
619
Treacherous tip of me reaching and crowding to help them,
620
My flesh and blood playing out lightning, to strike what is hardly different from
myself,
myself,
621
On all sides prurient provokers stiffening my limbs,
622
Straining the udder of my heart for its withheld drip,
623
Behaving licentious toward me, taking no denial,
624
Depriving me of my best as for a purpose,
625
Unbuttoning my clothes and holding me by the bare waist,
626
Deluding my confusion with the calm of the sunlight and pasture fields,
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Leaves of Grass. 33
627
Immodestly sliding the fellow-senses away,
628
They bribed to swap off with touch, and go and graze at the edges of me,
629
No consideration, no regard for my draining strength or my anger,
630
Fetching the rest of the herd around to enjoy them awhile,
631
Then all uniting to stand on a headland and worry me.
632
The sentries desert every other part of me,
633
They have left me helpless to a red marauder,
634
They all come to the headland to witness and assist against me.
635
I am given up by traitors;
636
I talk wildly . . . . I have lost my wits . . . . I and nobody else am the greatest
traitor,
traitor,
637
I went myself first to the headland . . . . my own hands carried me there.
638
You villain touch! what are you doing? . . . . my breath is tight in its throat;
639
Unclench your floodgates! you are too much for me.
640
Blind loving wrestling touch! Sheathed hooded sharptoothed touch!
641
Did it make you ache so leaving me?
642
Parting tracked by arriving . . . . perpetual payment of the perpetual loan,
643
Rich showering rain, and recompense richer afterward.
644
Sprouts take and accumulate . . . . stand by the curb prolific and vital,
645
Landscapes projected masculine full-sized and golden.
646
All truths wait in all things,
647
They neither hasten their own delivery nor resist it,
648
They do not need the obstetric forceps of the surgeon,
649
The insignificant is as big to me as any,
650
What is less or more than a touch?
651
Logic and sermons never convince,
652
The damp of the night drives deeper into my soul.
653
Only what proves itself to every man and woman is so,
654
Only what nobody denies is so.
655
A minute and a drop of me settle my brain;
656
I believe the soggy clods shall become lovers and lamps,
657
And a compend of compends is the meat of a man or woman,
658
And a summit and flower there is the feeling they have for each other,
659
And they are to branch boundlessly out of that lesson until it becomes omnific,
660
And until every one shall delight us, and we them.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
34 Leaves of Grass.
661
I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journeywork of the stars,
662
And the pismire is equally perfect, and a grain of sand, and the egg of the wren,
663
And the tree-toad is a chef-d'ouvre for the highest,
664
And the running blackberry would adorn the parlors of heaven,
665
And the narrowest hinge in my hand puts to scorn all machinery,
666
And the cow crunching with depressed head surpasses any statue,
667
And a mouse is miracle enough to stagger sextillions of infidels,
668
And I could come every afternoon of my life to look at the farmer's girl boiling her
iron tea-kettle and baking shortcake.
iron tea-kettle and baking shortcake.
669
I find I incorporate gneiss and coal and long-threaded moss and fruits and grains and
esculent roots,
esculent roots,
670
And am stucco'd with quadrupeds and birds all over,
671
And have distanced what is behind me for good reasons,
672
And call any thing close again when I desire it.
673
In vain the speeding or shyness,
674
In vain the plutonic rocks send their old heat against my approach,
675
In vain the mastadon retreats beneath its own powdered bones,
676
In vain objects stand leagues off and assume manifold shapes,
677
In vain the ocean settling in hollows and the great monsters lying low,
678
In vain the buzzard houses herself with the sky,
679
In vain the snake slides through the creepers and logs,
680
In vain the elk takes to the inner passes of the woods,
681
In vain the razorbilled auk sails far north to Labrador,
682
I follow quickly . . . . I ascend to the nest in the fissure of the cliff.
683
I think I could turn and live awhile with the animals . . . . they are so placid and self-
contained,
contained,
684
I stand and look at them sometimes half the day long.
685
They do not sweat and whine about their condition,
686
They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins,
687
They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God,
688
Not one is dissatisfied . . . . not one is demented with the mania of owning things,
689
Not one kneels to another nor to his kind that lived thousands of years ago,
690
Not one is respectable or industrious over the whole earth.
691
So they show their relations to me and I accept them;
692
They bring me tokens of myself . . . . they evince them plainly in their possession.
693
I do not know where they got those tokens,
694
I must have passed that way untold times ago and negligently dropt them,
695
Myself moving forward then and now and forever,
696
Gathering and showing more always and with velocity,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 35
697
Infinite and omnigenous and the like of these among them;
698
Not too exclusive toward the reachers of my remembrancers,
699
Picking out here one that shall be my amie,
700
Choosing to go with him on brotherly terms.
701
A gigantic beauty of a stallion, fresh and responsive to my caresses,
702
Head high in the forehead and wide between the ears,
703
Limbs glossy and supple, tail dusting the ground,
704
Eyes well apart and full of sparkling wickedness . . . . ears finely cut and flexibly
moving.
moving.
705
His nostrils dilate . . . . my heels embrace him . . . . his well built limbs tremble with
pleasure . . . . we speed around and return.
pleasure . . . . we speed around and return.
706
I but use you a moment and then I resign you stallion . . . . and do not need your
paces, and outgallop them,
paces, and outgallop them,
707
And myself as I stand or sit pass faster than you.
708
Swift wind! Space! My Soul! Now I know it is true what I guessed at;
709
What I guessed when I loafed on the grass,
710
What I guessed while I lay alone in my bed . . . . and again as I walked the beach
under the paling stars of the morning.
under the paling stars of the morning.
711
My ties and ballasts leave me . . . . I travel . . . . I sail . . . . my elbows rest in the
sea-gaps,
sea-gaps,
712
I skirt the sierras . . . . my palms cover continents,
713
I am afoot with my vision.
714
By the city's quadrangular houses . . . . in log-huts, or camping with lumbermen,
715
Along the ruts of the turnpike . . . . along the dry gulch and rivulet bed,
716
Hoeing my onion-patch, and rows of carrots and parsnips . . . . crossing savannas . . .
trailing in forests,
trailing in forests,
717
Prospecting . . . . gold-digging . . . . girdling the trees of a new purchase,
718
Scorched ankle-deep by the hot sand . . . . hauling my boat down the shallow river;
719
Where the panther walks to and fro on a limb overhead . . . . where the buck turns
furiously at the hunter,
furiously at the hunter,
720
Where the rattlesnake suns his flabby length on a rock . . . . where the otter is
feeding on fish,
feeding on fish,
721
Where the alligator in his tough pimples sleeps by the bayou,
722
Where the black bear is searching for roots or honey . . . . where the beaver pats
the mud with his paddle-tail;
the mud with his paddle-tail;
723
Over the growing sugar . . . . over the cottonplant . . . . over the rice in its low
moist field;
moist field;
724
Over the sharp-peaked farmhouse with its scalloped scum and slender shoots from
the gutters;
the gutters;
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
36 Leaves of Grass.
725
Over the western persimmon . . . . over the longleaved corn and the delicate blue-
flowered flax;
flowered flax;
726
Over the white and brown buckwheat, a hummer and a buzzer there with the rest,
727
Over the dusky green of the rye as it ripples and shades in the breeze;
728
Scaling mountains . . . . pulling myself cautiously up . . . . holding on by low scrag-
ged limbs,
ged limbs,
729
Walking the path worn in the grass and beat through the leaves of the brush;
730
Where the quail is whistling betwixt the woods and the wheatlot,
731
Where the bat flies in the July eve . . . . where the great goldbug drops through the
dark;
dark;
732
Where the flails keep time on the barn floor,
733
Where the brook puts out of the roots of the old tree and flows to the meadow,
734
Where cattle stand and shake away flies with the tremulous shuddering of their
hides,
hides,
735
Where the cheese-cloth hangs in the kitchen, and andirons straddle the hearth-slab,
and cobwebs fall in festoons from the rafters;
and cobwebs fall in festoons from the rafters;
736
Where triphammers crash . . . . where the press is whirling its cylinders;
737
Wherever the human heart beats with terrible throes out of its ribs;
738
Where the pear-shaped balloon is floating aloft . . . . floating in it myself and look-
ing composedly down;
ing composedly down;
739
Where the life-car is drawn on the slipnoose . . . . where the heat hatches pale-
green eggs in the dented sand,
green eggs in the dented sand,
740
Where the she-whale swims with her calves and never forsakes them,
741
Where the steamship trails hindways its long pennant of smoke,
742
Where the ground-shark's fin cuts like a black chip out of the water,
743
Where the half-burned brig is riding on unknown currents,
744
Where shells grow to her slimy deck, and the dead are corrupting below;
745
Where the striped and starred flag is borne at the head of the regiments;
746
Approaching Manhattan, up by the long-stretching island,
747
Under Niagara, the cataract falling like a veil over my countenance;
748
Upon a door-step . . . . upon the horse-block of hard wood outside,
749
Upon the race-course, or enjoying pic-nics or jigs or a good game of base-ball,
750
At he-festivals with blackguard jibes and ironical license and bull-dances and
drinking and laughter,
drinking and laughter,
751
At the cider-mill, tasting the sweet of the brown sqush . . . . sucking the juice
through a straw,
through a straw,
752
At apple-pealings, wanting kisses for all the red fruit I find,
753
At musters and beach-parties and friendly bees and huskings and house-raisings;
754
Where the mockingbird sounds his delicious gurgles, and cackles and screams and
weeps,
weeps,
755
Where the hay-rick stands in the barnyard, and the dry-stalks are scattered, and the
brood cow waits in the hovel,
brood cow waits in the hovel,
756
Where the bull advances to do his masculine work, and the stud to the mare, and the
cock is treading the hen,
cock is treading the hen,
757
Where the heifers browse, and the geese nip their food with short jerks;
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 37
758
Where the sundown shadows lengthen over the limitless and lonesome prairie,
759
Where the herds of buffalo make a crawling spread of the square miles far and
near;
near;
760
Where the hummingbird shimmers . . . . where the neck of the longlived swan is
curving and winding;
curving and winding;
761
Where the laughing-gull scoots by the slappy shore and laughs her near-human
laugh;
laugh;
762
Where beehives range on a gray bench in the garden half-hid by the high weeds;
763
Where the band-necked partridges roost in a ring on the ground with their heads
out;
out;
764
Where burial coaches enter the arched gates of a cemetery;
765
Where winter wolves bark amid wastes of snow and icicled trees;
766
Where the yellow-crowned heron comes to the edge of the marsh at night and feeds
upon small crabs;
upon small crabs;
767
Where the splash of swimmers and divers cools the warm noon;
768
Where the katydid works her chromatic reed on the walnut-tree over the well;
769
Through patches of citrons and cucumbers with silver-wired leaves,
770
Through the salt-lick or orange glade . . . . or under conical furs;
771
Through the gymnasium . . . . through the curtained saloon . . . . through the office
or public hall;
or public hall;
772
Pleased with the native and pleased with the foreign . . . . pleased with the new
and old,
and old,
773
Pleased with women, the homely as well as the handsome,
774
Pleased with the quakeress as she puts off her bonnet and talks melodiously,
775
Pleased with the primitive tunes of the choir of the whitewashed church,
776
Pleased with the earnest words of the sweating Methodist preacher, or any preacher
. . . . looking seriously at the camp-meeting;
. . . . looking seriously at the camp-meeting;
777
Looking in at the shop-windows in Broadway the whole forenoon . . . . pressing the
flesh of my nose to the thick plate-glass,
flesh of my nose to the thick plate-glass,
778
Wandering the same afternoon with my face turned up to the clouds;
779
My right and left arms round the sides of two friends and I in the middle;
780
Coming home with the bearded and dark-cheeked bush-boy . . . . riding behind him
at the drape of the day;
at the drape of the day;
781
Far from the settlements studying the print of animals' feet, or the moccasin print;
782
By the cot in the hospital reaching lemonade to a feverish patient,
783
By the coffined corpse when all is still, examining with a candle;
784
Voyaging to every port to dicker and adventure;
785
Hurrying with the modern crowd, as eager and fickle as any,
786
Hot toward one I hate, ready in my madness to knife him;
787
Solitary at midnight in my back yard, my thoughts gone from me a long while,
788
Walking the old hills of Judea with the beautiful gentle god by my side;
789
Speeding through space . . . . speeding through heaven and the stars,
790
Speeding amid the seven satellites and the broad ring and the diameter of eighty
thousand miles,
thousand miles,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
38 Leaves of Grass.
791
Speeding with tailed meteors . . . . throwing fire-balls like the rest,
792
Carrying the crescent child that carries its own full mother in its belly;
793
Storming enjoying planning loving cautioning,
794
Backing and filling, appearing and disappearing,
795
I tread day and night such roads.
796
I visit the orchards of God and look at the spheric product,
797
And look at quintillions ripened, and look at quintillions green.
798
I fly the flight of the fluid and swallowing soul,
799
My course runs below the soundings of plummets.
800
I help myself to material and immaterial,
801
No guard can shut me off, no law can prevent me.
802
I anchor my ship for a little while only,
803
My messengers continually cruise away or bring their returns to me.
804
I go hunting polar furs and the seal . . . . leaping chasms with a pike-pointed staff
. . . . clinging to topples of brittle and blue.
. . . . clinging to topples of brittle and blue.
805
I ascend to the foretruck . . . . I take my place late at night in the crow's nest . . . .
we sail through the arctic sea . . . . it is plenty light enough,
we sail through the arctic sea . . . . it is plenty light enough,
806
Through the clear atmosphere I stretch around on the wonderful beauty,
807
The enormous masses of ice pass me and I pass them . . . . the scenery is plain in
all directions,
all directions,
808
The white-topped mountains point up in the distance . . . . I fling out my fancies
toward them;
toward them;
809
We are about approaching some great battlefield in which we are soon to be
engaged,
engaged,
810
We pass the colossal outposts of the encampments . . . . we pass with still feet and
caution;
caution;
811
Or we are entering by the suburbs some vast and ruined city . . . . the blocks and
fallen architecture more than all the living cities of the globe.
fallen architecture more than all the living cities of the globe.
812
I am a free companion . . . . I bivouac by invading watchfires.
813
I turn the bridegroom out of bed and stay with the bride myself,
814
And tighten her all night to my thighs and lips.
815
My voice is the wife's voice, the screech by the rail of the stairs,
816
They fetch my man's body up dripping and drowned.
817
I understand the large hearts of heroes,
818
The courage of present times and all times;
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 39
819
How the skipper saw the crowded and rudderless wreck of the steamship, and death
chasing it up and down the storm,
chasing it up and down the storm,
820
How he knuckled tight and gave not back one inch, and was faithful of days and
faithful of nights,
faithful of nights,
821
And chalked in large letters on a board, Be of good cheer, We will not desert you;
822
How he saved the drifting company at last,
823
How the lank loose-gowned women looked when boated from the side of their
prepared graves,
prepared graves,
824
How the silent old-faced infants, and the lifted sick, and the sharp-lipped unshaved
men;
men;
825
All this I swallow and it tastes good . . . . I like it well, and it becomes mine,
826
I am the man . . . . I suffered . . . . I was there.
827
The disdain and calmness of martyrs,
828
The mother condemned for a witch and burnt with dry wood, and her children
gazing on;
gazing on;
829
The hounded slave that flags in the race and leans by the fence, blowing and
covered with sweat,
covered with sweat,
830
The twinges that sting like needles his legs and neck,
831
The murderous buckshot and the bullets,
832
All these I feel or am.
833
I am the hounded slave . . . . I wince at the bite of the dogs,
834
Hell and despair are upon me . . . . crack and again crack the marksmen,
835
I clutch the rails of the fence . . . . my gore dribs thinned with the ooze of my skin,
836
I fall on the weeds and stones,
837
The riders spur their unwilling horses and haul close,
838
They taunt my dizzy ears . . . . they beat me violently over the head with their
whip-stocks.
whip-stocks.
839
Agonies are one of my changes of garments;
840
I do not ask the wounded person how he feels . . . . I myself become the wounded
person,
person,
841
My hurt turns livid upon me as I lean on a cane and observe.
842
I am the mashed fireman with breastbone broken . . . . tumbling walls buried me in
their debris,
their debris,
843
Heat and smoke I inspired . . . . I heard the yelling shouts of my comrades,
844
I heard the distant click of their picks and shovels;
845
They have cleared the beams away . . . . they tenderly lift me forth.
846
I lie in the night air in my red shirt . . . . the pervading hush is for my sake,
847
Painless after all I lie, exhausted but not so unhappy,
848
White and beautiful are the faces around me . . . . the heads are bared of their fire-
caps,
caps,
849
The kneeling crowd fades with the light of the torches.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
40 Leaves of Grass.
850
Distant and dead resuscitate,
851
They show as the dial or move as the hands of me . . . . and I am the clock myself.
852
I am an old artillerist, and tell of some fort's bombardment . . . . and am there again.
853
Again the reveille of drummers . . . . again the attacking cannon and mortars and
howitzers,
howitzers,
854
Again the attacked send their cannon responsive.
855
I take part . . . . I see and hear the whole,
856
The cries and curses and roar . . . . the plaudits for well aimed shots,
857
The ambulanza slowly passing and trailing its red drip,
858
Workmen searching after damages and to make indispensible repairs,
859
The fall of grenades through the rent roof . . . . the fan-shaped explosion,
860
The whizz of limbs heads stone wood and iron high in the air.
861
Again gurgles the mouth of my dying general . . . . he furiously waves with his
hand,
hand,
862
He gasps through the clot . . . . Mind not me . . . . mind . . . . the entrenchments.
863
I tell not the fall of Alamo . . . . not one escaped to tell the fall of Alamo,
864
The hundred and fifty are dumb yet at Alamo.
865
Hear now the tale of a jetblack sunrise,
866
Hear of the murder in cold blood of four hundred and twelve young men.
867
Retreating they had formed in a hollow square with their baggage for breastworks,
868
Nine hundred lives out of the surrounding enemy's nine times their number was the
price they took in advance,
price they took in advance,
869
Their colonel was wounded and their ammunition gone,
870
They treated for an honorable capitulation, received writing and seal, gave up their
arms, and marched back prisoners of war.
arms, and marched back prisoners of war.
871
They were the glory of the race of rangers,
872
Matchless with a horse, a rifle, a song, a supper or a courtship,
873
Large, turbulent, brave, handsome, generous, proud and affectionate,
874
Bearded, sunburnt, dressed in the free costume of hunters,
875
Not a single one over thirty years of age.
876
The second Sunday morning they were brought out in squads and massacred . . . . it
was beautiful early summer,
was beautiful early summer,
877
The work commenced about five o'clock and was over by eight.
878
None obeyed the command to kneel,
879
Some made a mad and helpless rush . . . . some stood stark and straight,
880
A few fell at once, shot in the temple or heart . . . . the living and dead lay together,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 41
881
The maimed and mangled dug in the dirt . . . . the new-comers saw them there;
882
Some half-killed attempted to crawl away,
883
These were dispatched with bayonets or battered with the blunts of muskets;
884
A youth not seventeen years old seized his assassin till two more came to release
him,
him,
885
The three were all torn, and covered with the boy's blood.
886
At eleven o'clock began the burning of the bodies;
887
And that is the tale of the murder of the four hundred and twelve young men,
888
And that was a jetblack sunrise.
889
Did you read in the seabooks of the oldfashioned frigate-fight?
890
Did you learn who won by the light of the moon and stars?
891
Our foe was no skulk in his ship, I tell you,
892
His was the English pluck, and there is no tougher or truer, and never was, and
never will be;
never will be;
893
Along the lowered eve he came, horribly raking us.
894
We closed with him . . . . the yards entangled . . . . the cannon touched,
895
My captain lashed fast with his own hands.
896
We had received some eighteen-pound shots under the water,
897
On our lower-gun-deck two large pieces had burst at the first fire, killing all around
and blowing up overhead.
and blowing up overhead.
898
Ten o'clock at night, and the full moon shining and the leaks on the gain, and five feet
of water reported,
of water reported,
899
The master-at-arms loosing the prisoners confined in the after-hold to give them a
chance for themselves.
chance for themselves.
900
The transit to and from the magazine was now stopped by the sentinels,
901
They saw so many strange faces they did not know whom to trust.
902
Our frigate was afire . . . . the other asked if we demanded quarters? if our colors
were struck and the fighting done?
were struck and the fighting done?
903
I laughed content when I heard the voice of my little captain,
904
We have not struck, he composedly cried, We have just begun our part of the
fighting.
fighting.
905
Only three guns were in use,
906
One was directed by the captain himself against the enemy's mainmast,
907
Two well-served with grape and canister silenced his musketry and cleared his decks.
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42 Leaves of Grass.
908
The tops alone seconded the fire of this little battery, especially the maintop,
909
They all held out bravely during the whole of the action.
910
Not a moment's cease,
911
The leaks gained fast on the pumps . . . . the fire eat toward the powder-magazine,
912
One of the pumps was shot away . . . . it was generally thought we were sinking.
913
Serene stood the little captain,
914
He was not hurried . . . . his voice was neither high nor low,
915
His eyes gave more light to us than our battle-lanterns.
916
Toward twelve at night, there in the beams of the moon they surrendered to us.
917
Stretched and still lay the midnight,
918
Two great hulls motionless on the breast of the darkness,
919
Our vessel riddled and slowly sinking . . . . preparations to pass to the one we had
conquered,
conquered,
920
The captain on the quarter deck coldly giving his orders through a countenance
white as a sheet,
white as a sheet,
921
Near by the corpse of the child that served in the cabin,
922
The dead face of an old salt with long white hair and carefully curled whiskers,
923
The flames spite of all that could be done flickering aloft and below,
924
The husky voices of the two or three officers yet fit for duty,
925
Formless stacks of bodies and bodies by themselves . . . . dabs of flesh upon the
masts and spars,
masts and spars,
926
The cut of cordage and dangle of rigging . . . . the slight shock of the soothe of
waves,
waves,
927
Black and impassive guns, and litter of powder-parcels, and the strong scent,
928
Delicate sniffs of the seabreeze . . . . smells of sedgy grass and fields by the shore . . .
death-messages given in charge to survivors,
death-messages given in charge to survivors,
929
The hiss of the surgeon's knife and the gnawing teeth of his saw,
930
The wheeze, the cluck, the swash of falling blood . . . . the short wild scream, the
long dull tapering groan,
long dull tapering groan,
931
These so . . . . these irretrievable.
932
O Christ! My fit is mastering me!
933
What the rebel said gaily adjusting his throat to the rope-noose,
934
What the savage at the stump, his eye-sockets empty, his mouth spirting whoops
and defiance,
and defiance,
935
What stills the traveler come to the vault at Mount Vernon,
936
What sobers the Brooklyn boy as he looks down the shores of the Wallabout and
remembers the prison ships,
remembers the prison ships,
937
What burnt the gums of the redcoat at Saratoga when he surrendered his brigades,
938
These become mine and me every one, and they are but little,
939
I become as much more as I like.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 43
940
I become any presence or truth of humanity here,
941
And see myself in prison shaped like another man,
942
And feel the dull unintermitted pain.
943
For me the keepers of convicts shoulder their carbines and keep watch,
944
It is I let out in the morning and barred at night.
945
Not a mutineer walks handcuffed to the jail, but I am handcuffed to him and walk
by his side,
by his side,
946
I am less the jolly one there, and more the silent one with sweat on my twitching
lips.
lips.
947
Not a youngster is taken for larceny, but I go up too and am tried and sentenced.
948
Not a cholera patient lies at the last gasp, but I also lie at the last gasp,
949
My face is ash-colored, my sinews gnarl . . . . away from me people retreat.
950
Askers embody themselves in me, and I am embodied in them,
951
I project my hat and sit shamefaced and beg.
952
I rise extatic through all, and sweep with the true gravitation,
953
The whirling and whirling is elemental within me.
954
Somehow I have been stunned. Stand back!
955
Give me a little time beyond my cuffed head and slumbers and dreams and gaping,
956
I discover myself on a verge of the usual mistake.
957
That I could forget the mockers and insults!
958
That I could forget the trickling tears and the blows of the bludgeons and hammers!
959
That I could look with a separate look on my own crucifixion and bloody crowning!
960
I remember . . . . I resume the overstaid fraction,
961
The grave of rock multiplies what has been confided to it . . . . or to any
graves,
graves,
962
The corpses rise . . . . the gashes heal . . . . the fastenings roll away.
963
I troop forth replenished with supreme power, one of an average unending
procession,
procession,
964
We walk the roads of Ohio and Massachusetts and Virginia and Wisconsin and
New York and New Orleans and Texas and Montreal and San Francisco and
Charleston and Savannah and Mexico,
New York and New Orleans and Texas and Montreal and San Francisco and
Charleston and Savannah and Mexico,
965
Inland and by the seacoast and boundary lines . . . . and we pass the boundary lines.
966
Our swift ordinances are on their way over the whole earth,
967
The blossoms we wear in our hats are the growth of two thousand years.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
44 Leaves of Grass.
968
Eleves I salute you,
969
I see the approach of your numberless gangs . . . . I see you understand yourselves
and me,
and me,
970
And know that they who have eyes are divine, and the blind and lame are equally
divine,
divine,
971
And that my steps drag behind yours yet go before them,
972
And are aware how I am with you no more than I am with everybody.
973
The friendly and flowing savage . . . . Who is he?
974
Is he waiting for civilization or past it and mastering it?
975
Is he some southwesterner raised outdoors? Is he Canadian?
976
Is he from the Mississippi country? or from Iowa, Oregon or California? or from
the mountains? or prairie life or bush-life? or from the sea?
the mountains? or prairie life or bush-life? or from the sea?
977
Wherever he goes men and women accept and desire him,
978
They desire he should like them and touch them and speak to them and stay with
them.
them.
979
Behaviour lawless as snow-flakes . . . . words simple as grass . . . . uncombed head
and laughter and naivete;
and laughter and naivete;
980
Slowstepping feet and the common features, and the common modes and emanations,
981
They descend in new forms from the tips of his fingers,
982
They are wafted with the odor of his body or breath . . . . they fly out of the glance
of his eyes.
of his eyes.
983
Flaunt of the sunshine I need not your bask . . . . lie over,
984
You light surfaces only . . . . I force the surfaces and the depths also.
985
Earth! you seem to look for something at my hands,
986
Say old topknot! what do you want?
987
Man or woman! I might tell how I like you, but cannot,
988
And might tell what it is in me and what it is in you, but cannot,
989
And might tell the pinings I have . . . . the pulse of my nights and days.
990
Behold I do not give lectures or a little charity,
991
What I give I give out of myself.
992
You there, impotent, loose in the knees, open your scarfed chops till I blow grit
within you,
within you,
993
Spread your palms and lift the flaps of your pockets,
994
I am not to be denied . . . . I compel . . . . I have stores plenty and to spare,
995
And any thing I have I bestow.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 45
996
I do not ask who you are . . . . that is not important to me,
997
You can do nothing and be nothing but what I will infold you.
998
To a drudge of the cottonfields or emptier of privies I lean . . . . on his right cheek
I put the family kiss,
I put the family kiss,
999
And in my soul I swear I never will deny him.
1000
On women fit for conception I start bigger and nimbler babes,
1001
This day I am jetting the stuff of far more arrogant republics.
1002
To any one dying . . . . thither I speed and twist the knob of the door,
1003
Turn the bedclothes toward the foot of the bed,
1004
Let the physician and the priest go home.
1005
I seize the descending man . . . . I raise him with resistless will.
1006
O despairer, here is my neck,
1007
By God! you shall not go down! Hang your whole weight upon me.
1008
I dilate you with tremendous
breath . . . . I buoy you up;
1009
Every room of the house do I fill with am armed force . . . . lovers of me, bafflers
of graves:
of graves:
1010
Sleep! I and they keep guard all night;
1011
Not doubt, not decease shall dare to lay finger upon you,
1012
I have embraced you, and henceforth possess you to myself,
1013
And when you rise in the morning you will find what I tell you is so.
1014
I am he bringing help for the sick as they pant on their backs,
1015
And for strong upright men I bring yet more needed help.
1016
I heard what was said of the universe,
1017
Heard it and heard of several thousand years;
1018
It is middling well as far as it goes . . . . but is that all?
1019
Magnifying and applying come I,
1020
Outbidding at the start the old cautious hucksters,
1021
The most they offer for mankind and eternity less than a spirt of my own seminal
wet,
wet,
1022
Taking myself the exact dimensions of Jehovah and laying them away,
1023
Lithographing Kronos and Zeus his son, and Hercules his grandson,
1024
Buying drafts of Osiris and Isis and Belus and Brahma and Adonai,
1025
In my portfolio placing Manito loose, and Allah on a leaf, and the crucifix engraved,
1026
With Odin, and the hideous-faced Mexitli, and all idols and images,
1027
Honestly taking them all for what they are worth, and not a cent more,
1028
they were alive and did the work of their day,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
46 Leaves of Grass.
1029
Admitting they bore mites as for unfledged birds who have now to rise and fly and
sing for themselves,
sing for themselves,
1030
Accepting the rough deific sketches to fill out better in myself . . . . bestowing them
freely on each man and woman I see,
freely on each man and woman I see,
1031
Discovering as much or more in a framer framing a house,
1032
Putting higher claims for him there with his rolled-up sleeves, driving the mallet and
chisel;
chisel;
1033
Not objecting to special revelations . . . . considering a curl of smoke or a hair on
the back of my hand as curious as any revelation;
the back of my hand as curious as any revelation;
1034
Those ahold of fire-engines and hook-and-ladder ropes more to me than the gods of
the antique wars,
the antique wars,
1035
Minding their voices peal through the crash of destruction,
1036
Their brawny limbs passing safe over charred laths . . . . their white foreheads whole
and unhurt out of the flames;
and unhurt out of the flames;
1037
By the mechanic's wife with her babe at her nipple interceding for every person
born;
born;
1038
Three scythes at harvest whizzing in a row from three lusty angels with shirts
bagged out at their waists;
bagged out at their waists;
1039
The snag-toothed hostler with red hair redeeming sins past and to come,
1040
Selling all he possesses and traveling on foot to fee lawyers for his brother and sit
by him while he is tried for forgery:
by him while he is tried for forgery:
1041
What was strewn in the amplest strewing the square rod about me, and not filling
the square rod then;
the square rod then;
1042
The bull and the bug never worshipped half enough,
1043
Dung and dirt more admirable than was dreamed,
1044
The supernatural of no account . . . . myself waiting my time to be one of the
supremes,
supremes,
1045
The day getting ready for me when I shall do as much good as the best, and be as
prodigious,
prodigious,
1046
Guessing when I am it will not tickle me much to receive puffs out of pulpit or
print;
print;
1047
By my life-lumps! becoming already a creator!
1048
Putting myself here and now to the ambushed womb of the shadows!
1049
. . . . A call in the midst of the crowd,
1050
My own voice, orotund sweeping and final.
1051
Come my children,
1052
Come my boys and girls, and my women and household and intimates,
1053
Now the performer launches his nerve . . . . he has passed his prelude on the reeds
within.
within.
1054
Easily written loosefingered chords! I feel the thrum of their climax and close.
1055
My head evolves on my neck,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 47
1056
Music rolls, but not from the organ . . . . folks are around me, but they are no
household of mine.
household of mine.
1057
Ever the hard and unsunk ground,
1058
Ever the eaters and drinkers . . . . ever the upward and downward sun . . . . ever the
air and the ceaseless tides,
air and the ceaseless tides,
1059
Ever myself and my neighbors, refreshing and wicked and real,
1060
Ever the old inexplicable query . . . . ever that thorned thumb—that breath of itches
and thirsts,
and thirsts,
1061
Ever the vexer's hoot! hoot! till we find where the sly one hides and bring him
forth;
forth;
1062
Ever love . . . . ever the sobbing liquid of life,
1063
Ever the bandage under the chin . . . . ever the tressels of death.
1064
Here and there with dimes on the eyes walking,
1065
To feed the greed of the belly the brains liberally spooning,
1066
Tickets buying or taking or selling, but in to the feast never once going;
1067
Many sweating and ploughing and thrashing, and then the chaff for payment re-
ceiving,
ceiving,
1068
A few idly owning, and they the wheat continually claiming.
1069
This is the city . . . . and I am one of the citizens;
1070
schools,
1071
Benevolent societies, improvements, banks, tariffs, steamships, factories, markets,
1072
Stocks and stores and real estate and personal estate.
1073
They who piddle and patter here in collars and tailed coats . . . . I am aware who
they are . . . . and that they are not worms or fleas,
they are . . . . and that they are not worms or fleas,
1074
I acknowledge the duplicates of myself under all the scrape-lipped and pipe-legged
concealments.
concealments.
1075
The weakest and shallowest is deathless with me,
1076
What I do and say the same waits for them,
1077
Every thought that flounders in me the same flounders in them.
1078
I know perfectly well my own egotism,
1079
And know my omniverous words, and cannot say any less,
1080
And would fetch you whoever you are flush with myself.
1081
My words are words of a questioning, and to indicate reality;
1082
This printed and bound book . . . . but the printer and the printing-office boy?
1083
The marriage estate and settlement . . . . but the body and mind of the bridegroom?
also those of the bride?
also those of the bride?
1084
The panorama of the sea . . . . but the sea itself?
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
48 Leaves of Grass.
1085
The well-taken photographs . . . . but your wife or friend close and solid in your
arms?
arms?
1086
The fleet of ships of the line and all the modern improvements . . . . but the craft
and pluck of the admiral?
and pluck of the admiral?
1087
The dishes and fare and furniture . . . . but the host and hostess, and the look out of
their eyes?
their eyes?
1088
The sky up there . . . . yet here or next door or across the way?
1089
The saints and sages in history . . . . but you yourself?
1090
Sermons and creeds and theology . . . . but the human brain, and what is called
reason, and what is called love, and what is called life?
reason, and what is called love, and what is called life?
1091
I do not despise you priests;
1092
My faith is the greatest of faiths and the least of faiths,
1093
Enclosing all worship ancient and modern, and all between ancient and modern,
1094
Believing I shall come again upon the earth after five thousand years,
1095
Waiting responses from oracles . . . . honoring the gods . . . . saluting the sun,
1096
Making a fetish of the first rock or stump . . . . powowing with sticks in the circle of
obis,
obis,
1097
Helping the lama or brahmin as he trims the lamps of the idols,
1098
Dancing yet through the streets in a phallic procession . . . . rapt and austere in the
woods, a gymnosophist,
woods, a gymnosophist,
1099
Drinking mead from the skull-cup . . . . to shasta and vedas admirant . . . . minding
the koran,
the koran,
1100
Walking the teokallis, spotted with gore from the stone and knife—beating the
serpent-skin drum;
serpent-skin drum;
1101
Accepting the gospels, accepting him that was crucified, knowing assuredly that he
is divine,
is divine,
1102
To the mass kneeling—to the puritan's prayer rising—sitting patiently in a pew,
1103
Ranting and frothing in my insane crisis—waiting dead-like till my spirit arouses me;
1104
Looking forth on pavement and land, and outside of pavement and land,
1105
Belonging to the winders of the circuit of circuits.
1106
One of that centripetal and centrifugal gang,
1107
I turn and talk like a man leaving charges before a journey.
1108
Down-hearted doubters, dull and excluded,
1109
Frivolous sullen moping angry affected disheartened atheistical,
1110
I know every one of you, and know the unspoken interrogatories,
1111
By experience I know them.
1112
How the flukes splash!
1113
How they contort rapid as lightning, with spasms and spouts of blood!
1114
Be at peace bloody flukes of doubters and sullen mopers,
1115
I take my place among you as much as among any;
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 49
1116
The past is the push of you and me and all precisely the same,
1117
And the
for you and me and all,
1118
And what is yet untried and afterward is for you and me and all.
1119
I do not know what is untried and afterward,
1120
But I know it is sure and alive and sufficient.
1121
Each who passes is considered, and each who stops is considered, and not a single
one can it fail.
one can it fail.
1122
It cannot fail the young man who died and was buried,
1123
Nor the young woman who died and was put by his side,
1124
Nor the little child that peeped in at the door and then drew back and was never
seen again,
seen again,
1125
Nor the old man who has lived without purpose, and feels it with bitterness worse
than gall,
than gall,
1126
Nor him in the poorhouse tubercled by rum and the bad disorder,
1127
Nor the numberless slaughtered and wrecked . . . . nor the brutish koboo, called the
ordure of humanity,
ordure of humanity,
1128
Nor the sacs merely floating with open mouths for food to slip in,
1129
Nor any thing in the earth, or down in the oldest graves of the earth,
1130
Nor any thing in the myriads of spheres, nor one of the myriads of myriads that in-
habit them,
habit them,
1131
Nor the present, nor the least wisp that is known.
1132
It is time to explain myself . . . . let us stand up.
1133
What is known I strip away . . . . I launch all men and women forward with me into
the unknown.
the unknown.
1134
The clock indicates the moment . . . . but what does eternity indicate?
1135
Eternity lies in bottomless reservoirs . . . . its buckets are rising forever and ever,
1136
They pour and they pour and they exhale away.
1137
We have thus far exhausted trillions of winters and summers;
1138
There are trillions ahead, and trillions ahead of them.
1139
Births have brought us richness and variety,
1140
And other births will bring us richness and variety.
1141
I do not call one greater and one smaller,
1142
That which fills its period and place is equal to any.
1143
Were mankind murderous or jealous upon you my brother or my sister?
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
50 Leaves of Grass.
1144
I am sorry for you . . . . they are not murderous or jealous upon me;
1145
All has been gentle with me . . . . . . I keep no account with lamentation;
1146
What have I to do with lamentation?
1147
I am an acme of things accomplished, and I an encloser of things to be.
1148
My feet strike an apex of the apices of the stairs,
1149
On every step bunches of ages, and larger bunches between the steps,
1150
All below duly traveled—and still I mount and mount.
1151
Rise after rise bow the phantoms behind me,
1152
Afar down I see the huge first Nothing, the vapor from the nostrils of death,
1153
I know I was even there . . . . I waited unseen and always,
1154
And slept while God carried me through the lethargic mist,
1155
And took my time . . . . and took no hurt from the fœtid carbon.
1156
Long I was hugged close . . . . long and
.
1157
Immense have been the preparations for me,
1158
Faithful and friendly the arms that have helped me.
1159
Cycles ferried my cradle, rowing and rowing like cheerful boatmen;
1160
For room to me stars kept aside in their own rings,
1161
They sent influences to look after what was to hold me.
1162
Before I was born out of my mother generations guided me,
1163
My embryo has never been torpid . . . . nothing could overlay it;
1164
For it the nebula cohered to an orb . . . . the long slow strata piled to rest it on
. . . . vast vegetables gave it sustenance,
. . . . vast vegetables gave it sustenance,
1165
Monstrous sauroids transported it in their mouths and deposited it with care.
1166
All forces have been steadily employed to complete and delight me,
1167
Now I stand on this spot with my soul.
1168
Span of youth! Ever-pushed elasticity! Manhood balanced and florid and full!
1169
My lovers suffocate me!
1170
Crowding my lips, and thick in the pores of my skin,
1171
Jostling me through streets and public halls . . . . coming naked to me at night,
1172
Crying by day Ahoy from the rocks of the river . . . . swinging and chirping over my
head,
head,
1173
Calling my name from flowerbeds or vines or tangled underbrush,
1174
Or while I swim in the bath . . . . or drink from the pump at the corner . . . . or the
curtain is down at the opera . . . . or I glimpse at a woman's face in the
railroad car;
curtain is down at the opera . . . . or I glimpse at a woman's face in the
railroad car;
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 51
1175
Lighting on every moment of my life,
1176
Bussing my body with soft and balsamic busses,
1177
Noiselessly passing handfuls out of their hearts and giving them to be mine.
1178
Old age superbly rising! Ineffable grace of dying days!
1179
Every condition promulges not only itself . . . . it promulges what grows after and out
of itself,
of itself,
1180
And the dark hush promulges as much as any.
1181
I open my scuttle at night and see the far-sprinkled systems,
1182
And all I see, multiplied as high as I can cipher, edge but the rim of the farther
systems.
systems.
1183
Wider and wider they spread, expanding and always expanding,
1184
Outward and outward and forever outward.
1185
My sun has his sun, and round him obediently wheels,
1186
He joins with his partners a group of superior circuit,
1187
And greater sets follow, making specks of the greatest inside them.
1188
There is no stoppage, and never can be stoppage;
1189
If I and you and the worlds and all beneath or upon their surfaces, and all the
palpable life, were this moment reduced back to a pallid float, it would not
avail in the long run,
palpable life, were this moment reduced back to a pallid float, it would not
avail in the long run,
1190
We should surely bring up again where we now stand,
1191
And as surely go as much farther, and then farther and farther.
1192
A few quadrillions of eras, a few octillions of cubic leagues, do not hazard the span,
or make it impatient,
or make it impatient,
1193
They are but parts . . . . any thing is but a part.
1194
See ever so far . . . . there is limitless space outside of that,
1195
Count ever so much . . . . there is limitless time around that.
1196
Our rendezvous is fitly appointed . . . . God will be there and wait till we come.
1197
I know I have the best of time and space—and that I was never measured, and
never will be measured.
never will be measured.
1198
I tramp a perpetual journey,
1199
My signs are a rain-proof coat and good shoes and a staff cut from the woods;
1200
No friend of mine takes his ease in my chair,
1201
I have no chair, nor church nor philosophy;
1202
I lead no man to a dinner-table or library or exchange,
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52 Leaves of Grass.
1203
But each man and each woman of you I lead upon a knoll,
1204
My left hand hooks you round the waist,
1205
My right hand points to landscapes of continents, and a plain public road.
1206
Not I, not any one else can travel that road for you,
1207
You must travel it for yourself.
1208
It is not far . . . . it is within reach,
1209
Perhaps you have been on it since you were born, and did not know,
1210
Perhaps it is every where on water and on land.
1211
Shoulder your duds, and I will mine, and let us hasten forth;
1212
Wonderful cities and free nations we shall fetch as we go.
1213
If you tire, give me both burdens, and rest the chuff of your hand on my hip,
1214
And in due time you shall repay the same service to me;
1215
For after we start we never lie by again.
1216
This day before dawn I ascended a hill and looked at the crowded heaven,
1217
And I said to my spirit, When we become the enfolders of those orbs and the plea-
sure and knowledge of every thing in them, shall we be filled and satisfied then?
sure and knowledge of every thing in them, shall we be filled and satisfied then?
1218
And my spirit said No, we level that lift to pass and continue beyond.
1219
You are also asking me questions, and I hear you;
1220
I answer that I cannot answer . . . . you must find out for yourself.
1221
Sit awhile wayfarer,
1222
Here are biscuits to eat and here is milk to drink,
1223
But as soon as you sleep and renew yourself in sweet clothes I will certainly kiss you
with my goodbye kiss and open the gate for your egress hence.
with my goodbye kiss and open the gate for your egress hence.
1224
Long enough have you dreamed contemptible dreams,
1225
Now I wash the gum from your eyes,
1226
You must habit yourself to the dazzle of the light and of every moment of your
life
life
1227
Long have you timidly waded, holding a plank by the shore,
1228
Now I will you to be a bold swimmer,
1229
To jump off in the midst of the sea, and rise again and nod to me and shout, and
laughingly dash with your hair.
laughingly dash with your hair.
1230
I am the teacher of athletes,
1231
He that by me spreads a wider breast than my own proves the width of my own,
1232
He most honors my style who learns under it to destroy the teacher.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 53
1233
The boy I love, the same becomes a man not through derived power but in his own
right,
right,
1234
Wicked, rather than virtuous out of conformity or fear,
1235
Fond of his sweetheart, relishing well his steak,
1236
Unrequited love or a slight cutting him worse than a wound cuts,
1237
First rate to ride, to fight, to hit the bull's eye, to sail a skiff, to sing a song or play
on the banjo,
on the banjo,
1238
Preferring scars and faces pitted with smallpox over all latherers and those that
keep out of the sun.
keep out of the sun.
1239
I teach straying from me, yet who can stray from me?
1240
I follow you whoever you are from the present hour;
1241
My words itch at your ears till you understand them.
1242
I do not say these things for a dollar, or to fill up the time while I wait for a boat;
1243
It is you talking just as much as myself . . . . I act as the tongue of you,
1244
It was tied in your mouth . . . . in mine it begins to be loosened.
1245
I swear I will never mention love or death inside a house,
1246
And I swear I never will translate myself at all, only to him or her who privately
stays with me in the open air.
stays with me in the open air.
1247
If you would understand me go to the heights or water-shore,
1248
The nearest gnat is an explanation and a drop or the motion of waves a key,
1249
The maul the oar and the handsaw second my words.
1250
No shuttered room or school can commune with me,
1251
But roughs and little children better than they.
1252
The young mechanic is closest to me . . . . he knows me pretty well,
1253
The woodman that takes his axe and jug with him shall take me with him all day,
1254
The farmboy ploughing in the field feels good at the sound of my voice,
1255
In vessels that sail my words must sail . . . . I go with fishermen and seamen, and
love them,
love them,
1256
My face rubs to the hunter's face when he lies down alone in his blanket,
1257
The driver thinking of me does not mind the jolt of his wagon,
1258
The young mother and old mother shall comprehend me,
1259
The girl and the wife rest the needle a moment and forget where they are,
1260
They and all would resume what I have told them.
1261
I have said that the soul is not more than the body,
1262
And I have said that the body is not more than the soul,
1263
And nothing, not God, is greater to one than one's-self is,
1264
And whoever walks a furlong without sympathy walks to his own funeral, dressed in
his shroud,
his shroud,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
54 Leaves of Grass.
1265
And I or you pocketless of a dime may purchase the pick of the earth,
1266
And to glance with an eye or show a bean in its pod confounds the learning of all
times,
times,
1267
And there is no trade or employment but the young man following it may become a
hero,
hero,
1268
And there is no object so soft but it makes a hub for the wheeled universe,
1269
And any man or woman shall stand cool and supercilious before a million universes.
1270
And I call to mankind, Be not curious about God,
1271
For I who am curious about each am not curious about God,
1272
No array of terms can say how much I am at peace about God and about death.
1273
I hear and behold God in every object, yet I understand God not in the least,
1274
Nor do I understand who there can be more wonderful than myself.
1275
Why should I wish to see God better than this day?
1276
I see something of God each hour of the twenty-four, and each moment then,
1277
In the faces of men and women I see God, and in my own face in the glass;
1278
I find letters from God dropped in the street, and every one is signed by God's name,
1279
And I leave them where they are, for I know that others will punctually come for-
ever and ever.
ever and ever.
1280
And as to you death, and you bitter hug of mortality . . . . it is idle to try to alarm
me.
me.
1281
To his work without flinching the accoucheur comes,
1282
I see the elderhand pressing receiving supporting,
1283
I recline by the sills of the exquisite flexible doors . . . . and mark the outlet, and
mark the relief and escape.
mark the relief and escape.
1284
And as to you corpse I think you are good manure, but that does not offend me,
1285
I smell the white roses sweetscented and growing,
1286
I reach to the leafy lips . . . . I reach to the polished breasts of melons.
1287
And as to you life, I reckon you are the leavings of many deaths,
1288
No doubt I have died myself ten thousand times before.
1289
I hear you whispering there O stars of heaven,
1290
O suns . . . . O grass of graves . . . . O perpetual transfers and promotions . . . . if
you do not say anything how can I say anything?
you do not say anything how can I say anything?
1291
Of the turbid pool that lies in the autumn forest,
1292
Of the moon that descends the steeps of the soughing twilight,
1293
Toss, sparkles of day and dusk . . . . toss on the black stems that decay in the muck,
1294
Toss to the moaning gibberish of the dry limbs.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 55
1295
I ascend from the moon . . . . I ascend from the night,
1296
And perceive of the ghastly glitter the sunbeams reflected,
1297
And debouch to the steady and central from the offspring great or small.
1298
There is that in me . . . . I do not know what it is . . . . but I know it is in me.
1299
Wrenched and sweaty . . . . calm and cool then my body becomes;
1300
I sleep . . . . I sleep long.
1301
I do not know it . . . . it is without name . . . . it is a word unsaid,
1302
It is not in any dictionary or utterance or symbol.
1303
Something it swings on more than the earth I swing on,
1304
To it the creation is the friend whose embracing awakes me.
1305
Perhaps I might tell more . . . . Outlines! I plead for my brothers and sisters.
1306
Do you see O my brothers and sisters?
1307
It is not chaos or death . . . . it is form and union and plan . . . . it is eternal life . . . .
it is happiness.
it is happiness.
1308
The past and present wilt . . . . I have filled them and emptied them,
1309
And proceed to fill my next fold of the future.
1310
Listener up there! Here you . . . . what have you to confide to me?
1311
Look in my face while I snuff the sidle of evening,
1312
Talk honestly, for no one else hears you, and I stay only a minute longer.
1313
Do I contradict myself?
1314
Very well then . . . . I contradict myself;
1315
I am large . . . . I contain multitudes.
1316
I concentrate toward them that are nigh . . . . I wait on the door-slab.
1317
Who has done his day's work and will soonest be through with his supper?
1318
Who wishes to walk with me?
1319
Will you speak before I am gone? Will you prove already too late?
1320
The spotted hawk swoops by and accuses me . . . . he complains of my gab and my
loitering.
loitering.
1321
I too am not a bit tamed . . . . I too am untranslatable,
1322
I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.
1323
The last scud of day holds back for me,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
56 Leaves of Grass.
1324
It flings my likeness after the rest and true as any on the shadowed wilds,
1325
It coaxes me to the vapor and the dusk.
1326
I depart as air . . . . I shake my white locks at the runaway sun,
1327
I effuse my flesh in eddies and drift it in lacy jags.
1328
I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,
1329
If you want me again look for me under your bootsoles.
1330
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,
1331
But I shall be good health to you nevertheless,
1332
And filter and fibre your blood.
1333
Failing to fetch me me at first keep encouraged,
1334
Missing me one place search another,
1335
I stop some where waiting for
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Related Manuscripts
"Leaves of Grass" [2]
("A Song for Occupations")
"Leaves of Grass" [2]
("A Song for Occupations")
- duk.00263 (high)
- duk.00264 (high)
- loc.00013 (high)
- loc.00141 (high)
- loc.05589 (high)
- nyp.00129 (high)
- duk.00051 (low)
- duk.00148 (low)
- duk.00261 (low)
- duk.00262 (low)
- duk.00886 (low)
- loc.00024 (low)
- loc.00142 (low)
- nyp.00029 (low)
- nyp.00057 (low)
- nyp.00733 (low)
- tex.00057 (low)
- tex.00079 (low)
- tex.00088 (low)
- tul.00011 (low)
- uva.00251 (low)
- uva.00516 (low)
Leaves of Grass.
—————
1336
COME closer to me,
1337
Push close my lovers and take the best I possess,
1338
Yield closer and closer and give me the best you possess.
1339
This is unfinished business with me . . . . how is it with you?
1340
I was chilled with the cold types and cylinder and wet paper between us.
1341
I pass so poorly with paper and types . . . . I must pass with the contact of bodies
and souls.
and souls.
1342
I do not thank you for liking me as I am, and liking the touch of me . . . . I know that
it is good for you to do so.
it is good for you to do so.
1343
Were all educations practical and ornamental well displayed out of me, what would
it amount to?
it amount to?
1344
Were I as the head teacher or charitable proprietor or wise statesman, what would
it amount to?
it amount to?
1345
Were I to you as the boss employing and paying you, would that satisfy you?
1346
The learned and virtuous and benevolent, and the usual terms;
1347
A man like me, and never the usual terms.
1348
Neither a servant nor a master am I,
1349
I take no sooner a large price than a small price . . . . I will have my own whoever
enjoys me,
enjoys me,
1350
I will be even with you, and you shall be even with me.
1351
If you are a workman or
workwoman I stand as nigh as the nighest that works in
the same shop,
the same shop,
1352
If you bestow gifts on your brother or dearest friend, I demand as good as your
brother or dearest friend,
brother or dearest friend,
1353
If your lover or husband or wife is welcome by day or night, I must be personally as
welcome;
welcome;
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
58 Leaves of Grass.
1354
If you have become degraded or ill, then I will become so for your sake;
1355
If you remember your foolish and outlawed deeds, do you think I cannot remember
my foolish and outlawed deeds?
my foolish and outlawed deeds?
1356
If you carouse at the table I say I will carouse at the opposite side of the table;
1357
If you meet some stranger in the street and love him or her, do I not often meet
strangers in the street and love them?
strangers in the street and love them?
1358
If you see a good deal remarkable in me I see just as much remarkable in you.
1359
Why what have you thought of yourself?
1360
Is it you then that thought yourself less?
1361
Is it you that thought the President greater than you? or the rich better off than
you? or the educated wiser than you?
you? or the educated wiser than you?
1362
Because you are greasy or pimpled—or that you was once drunk, or a thief, or
diseased, or rheumatic, or a prostitute—or are so now—or from frivolity or
impotence—or that you are no scholar, and never saw your name in print . . . .
do you give in that you are any less immortal?
diseased, or rheumatic, or a prostitute—or are so now—or from frivolity or
impotence—or that you are no scholar, and never saw your name in print . . . .
do you give in that you are any less immortal?
1363
Souls of men and women! it is not you I call unseen, unheard, untouchable and
untouching;
untouching;
1364
It is not you I go argue pro and con about, and to settle whether you are alive or
no;
no;
1365
I own publicly who you are, if nobody else owns . . . . aud see and hear you, and
what you give and take;
what you give and take;
1366
What is there you cannot give and take?
1367
I see not merely that you are polite or whitefaced . . . . married or single . . . .
citizens of old states or citizens of new states . . . . eminent in some profession
. . . . a lady or gentleman in a parlor . . . . or dressed in the jail uniform . . . .
or pulpit uniform,
citizens of old states or citizens of new states . . . . eminent in some profession
. . . . a lady or gentleman in a parlor . . . . or dressed in the jail uniform . . . .
or pulpit uniform,
1368
Not only the free Utahan, Kansian, or Arkansian . . . . not only the free Cuban . . .
not merely the slave . . . . not Mexican native, or Flatfoot, or negro from
Africa,
not merely the slave . . . . not Mexican native, or Flatfoot, or negro from
Africa,
1369
Iroquois eating the warflesh—fishtearer in his lair of rocks and sand . . . .
Esquimaux in the dark cold snowhouse . . . . Chinese with his transverse eyes
. . . . Bedowee—or wandering nomad—or tabounschik at the head of his
droves,
Esquimaux in the dark cold snowhouse . . . . Chinese with his transverse eyes
. . . . Bedowee—or wandering nomad—or tabounschik at the head of his
droves,
1370
Grown, half-grown, and babe—of this country and every country, indoors and out-
doors I see . . . . and all else is behind or through them.
doors I see . . . . and all else is behind or through them.
1371
The wife—and she is not one jot less than the husband,
1372
The daughter—and she is just as good as the son,
1373
The mother—and she is every bit as much as the father.
1374
Offspring of those not rich—boys apprenticed to trades,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 59
1375
Young fellows working on farms and old fellows working on farms;
1376
The naive . . . . the simple and hardy . . . . he going to the polls to vote . . . . he
who has a good time, and he who has a bad time;
who has a good time, and he who has a bad time;
1377
Mechanics, southerners, new arrivals, sailors, mano'warsmen, merchantmen, coast-
ers,
ers,
1378
All these I see . . . . but nigher and farther the same I see;
1379
None shall escape me, and none shall wish to escape me.
1380
I bring what you much need, yet always have,
1381
I bring not money or amours or dress or eating . . . . but I bring as good;
1382
And send no agent or medium . . . . and offer no representative of value—but offer
the value itself.
the value itself.
1383
There is something that comes home to one now and perpetually,
1384
It is not what is printed or preached or discussed . . . . it eludes discussion and
print,
print,
1385
It is not to be put in a book . . . . it is not in this book,
1386
It is for you whoever you are . . . . it is no farther from you than your hearing and
sight are from you,
sight are from you,
1387
It is hinted by nearest and commonest and readiest . . . . it is not them, though it is
endlessly provoked by them . . . . What is there ready and near you now?
endlessly provoked by them . . . . What is there ready and near you now?
1388
You may read in many languages and read nothing about it;
1389
You may read the President's message and read nothing about it there,
1390
Nothing in the reports from the state department or treasury department . . . . or in
the daily papers, or the weekly papers,
the daily papers, or the weekly papers,
1391
Or in the census returns or assessors' returns or prices current or any accounts of
stock.
stock.
1392
The sun and stars that float in the open air . . . . the appleshaped earth and we upon
it . . . . surely the drift of them is something grand;
it . . . . surely the drift of them is something grand;
1393
I do not know what it is except that it is grand, and that it is happiness,
1394
And that the enclosing purport of us here is not a speculation, or bon-mot or
reconnoissance,
reconnoissance,
1395
And that it is not something which by luck may turn out well for us, and without
luck must be a failure for us,
luck must be a failure for us,
1396
And not something which may yet be retracted in a certain contingency.
1397
The light and shade—the curious sense of body and identity—the greed that
with perfect complaisance devours all things—the endless pride and out-
stretching of man—unspeakable joys and sorrows,
with perfect complaisance devours all things—the endless pride and out-
stretching of man—unspeakable joys and sorrows,
1398
The wonder every one sees in every one else he sees . . . . and the wonders that fill
each minute of time forever and each acre of surface and space forever,
each minute of time forever and each acre of surface and space forever,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
60 Leaves of Grass.
1399
Have you reckoned them as mainly for a trade or farmwork? or for the profits of
a store? or to achieve yourself a position? or to fill a gentleman's leisure or a
lady's leisure?
a store? or to achieve yourself a position? or to fill a gentleman's leisure or a
lady's leisure?
1400
Have you reckoned the landscape took substance and form that it might be painted
in a picture?
in a picture?
1401
Or men and women that they might be written of, and songs sung?
1402
Or the attraction of gravity and the great laws and harmonious combinations and
the fluids of the air as subjects for the savans?
the fluids of the air as subjects for the savans?
1403
Or the brown land and the blue sea for maps and charts?
1404
Or the stars to be put in constellations and named fancy names?
1405
Or that the growth of seeds is for agricultural tables or agriculture itself?
1406
Old institutions . . . . these arts libraries legends collections—and the practice
handed along in manufactures . . . . will we rate them so high?
handed along in manufactures . . . . will we rate them so high?
1407
Will we rate our prudence and business so high? . . . . I have no objection,
1408
I rate them as high as the highest . . . . but a child born of a woman and man I rate
beyond all rate.
beyond all rate.
1409
We thought our Union grand and our Constitution grand;
1410
I do not say they are not grand and good—for they are,
1411
I am this day just as much in love with them as you,
1412
But I am eternally in love with you and with all my fellows upon the earth.
1413
We consider the bibles and religions divine . . . . I do not say they are not divine,
1414
I say they have all grown out of you and may grow out of you still,
1415
It is not they who give the life . . . . it is you who give the life;
1416
Leaves are not more shed from the trees or trees from the earth than they are shed
out of you.
out of you.
1417
The sum of all known value and respect I add up in you whoever you are;
1418
The President is up there in the White House for you . . . . it is not you who are
here for him,
here for him,
1419
The Secretaries act in their bureaus for you . . . . not you here for them,
1420
The Congress convenes every December for you,
1421
Laws, courts, the forming of states, the charters of cities, the going and coming of
commerce and mails are all for you.
commerce and mails are all for you.
1422
All doctrines, all politics and civilization exurge from you,
1423
All sculpture and monuments and anything inscribed anywhere are tallied in you,
1424
The gist of histories and statistics as far back as the records reach is in you this
hour—and myths and tales the same;
hour—and myths and tales the same;
1425
If you were not breathing and walking here where would they all be?
1426
The most renowned poems would be ashes . . . . orations and plays would be
vacuums.
vacuums.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 61
1427
All architecture is what you do to it when you look upon it;
1428
Did you think it was in the white or gray stone? or the lines of the arches and
cornices?
cornices?
1429
All music is what awakens from you when you are reminded by the instruments,
1430
It is not the violins and the cornets . . . . it is not the oboe nor the beating drums—
nor the notes of the baritone singer singing his sweet romanza . . . . nor those
of the men's chorus, nor those of the women's chorus,
nor the notes of the baritone singer singing his sweet romanza . . . . nor those
of the men's chorus, nor those of the women's chorus,
1431
It is nearer and farther than they.
1432
Will the whole come back then?
1433
Can each see the signs of the best by a look in the lookingglass? Is there nothing
greater or more?
greater or more?
1434
Does all sit there with you and here with me?
1435
The old forever new things . . . . you foolish child! . . . . the closest simplest things
—this moment with you,
—this moment with you,
1436
Your person and every particle that relates to your person,
1437
The pulses of your brain waiting their chance and encouragement at every deed
or sight;
or sight;
1438
Anything you do in public by day, and anything you do in secret betweendays,
1439
What is called right and what is called wrong . . . . what you behold or touch . . . .
what causes your anger or wonder,
what causes your anger or wonder,
1440
The anklechain of the slave, the bed of the bedhouse, the cards of the gambler, the
plates of the forger;
plates of the forger;
1441
What is seen or learned in the street, or intuitively learned,
1442
What is learned in the public school—spelling, reading, writing and ciphering . . . .
the blackboard and the teacher's diagrams:
the blackboard and the teacher's diagrams:
1443
The panes of the windows and all that appears through them . . . . the going forth
in the morning and the aimless spending of the day;
in the morning and the aimless spending of the day;
1444
(What is it that you made money? what is it that you got what you wanted?)
1445
The usual routine . . . . the workshop, factory, yard, office, store, or desk;
1446
The jaunt of hunting or fishing, or the life of hunting or fishing,
1447
Pasturelife, foddering, milking and herding, and all the personnel and usages;
1448
The plum-orchard and apple-orchard . . . . gardening . . seedlings, cuttings, flowers
and vines,
and vines,
1449
Grains and manures . . marl, clay, loam . . the subsoil plough . . the shovel and pick
and rake and hoe . . irrigation and draining;
and rake and hoe . . irrigation and draining;
1450
The currycomb . . the horse-cloth . . the halter and bridle and bits . . the very wisps
of straw,
of straw,
1451
The barn and barn-yard . . the bins and mangers . . the mows and racks:
1452
Manufactures . . commerce . . engineering . . the building of cities, and every trade
carried on there . . and the implements of every trade,
carried on there . . and the implements of every trade,
1453
The anvil and tongs and hammer . . the axe and wedge . . the square and mitre and
jointer and smoothingplane;
jointer and smoothingplane;
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
62 Leaves of Grass.
1454
The plumbob and trowel and level . . the wall-scaffold, and the work of walls and
ceilings . . or any mason-work:
ceilings . . or any mason-work:
1455
The ship's compass . . the sailor's tarpaulin . . the stays and lanyards, and the ground-
tackle for anchoring or mooring,
tackle for anchoring or mooring,
1456
The sloop's tiller . . the pilot's wheel and bell . . the yacht or fish-smack . . the great
gay-pennanted three-hundred-foot steamboat under full headway, with her proud
fat breasts and her delicate swift-flashing paddles;
gay-pennanted three-hundred-foot steamboat under full headway, with her proud
fat breasts and her delicate swift-flashing paddles;
1457
The trail and line and hooks and sinkers . . the seine, and hauling the seine;
1458
Smallarms and rifles . . . . the powder and shot and caps and wadding . . . . the
ordnance for war . . . . the carriages:
ordnance for war . . . . the carriages:
1459
Everyday objects . . . . the housechairs, the carpet, the bed and the counterpane of
the bed, and him or her sleeping at night, and the wind blowing, and the indefi-
nite noises:
the bed, and him or her sleeping at night, and the wind blowing, and the indefi-
nite noises:
1460
The snowstorm or rainstorm . . . . the tow-trowsers . . . . the lodge-hut in the woods,
and the still-hunt:
and the still-hunt:
1461
City and country . . fireplace and candle . . gaslight and heater and aqueduct;
1462
The message of the governor, mayor, or chief of police . . . . the dishes of breakfast
or dinner or supper;
or dinner or supper;
1463
The bunkroom, the fire-engine, the string-team, and the car or truck behind;
1464
The paper I write on or you write on . . and every word we write . . and every
cross and twirl of the pen . . and the curious way we write what we think . . . .
yet very faintly;
cross and twirl of the pen . . and the curious way we write what we think . . . .
yet very faintly;
1465
The directory, the detector, the ledger . . . . the books in ranks or the bookshelves
. . . . the clock attached to the wall,
. . . . the clock attached to the wall,
1466
The ring on your finger . . the lady's wristlet . . the hammers of stonebreakers or
coppersmiths . . the druggist's vials and jars;
coppersmiths . . the druggist's vials and jars;
1467
The etui of surgical instruments, and the etui of oculist's or aurist's instruments, or
dentist's instruments;
dentist's instruments;
1468
Glassblowing, grinding of wheat and corn . . casting, and what is cast . . tinroofing,
shingledressing,
shingledressing,
1469
Shipcarpentering, flagging of sidewalks by flaggers . . dockbuilding, fishcuring, ferry-
ing;
ing;
1470
The pump, the piledriver, the great derrick . . the coalkiln and brickkiln,
1471
Ironworks or whiteleadworks . . the sugarhouse . . steam-saws, and the great mills
and factories;
and factories;
1472
The cottonbale . . the stevedore's hook . . the saw and buck of the sawyer . . the
screen of the coalscreener . . the mould of the moulder . . the workingknife of
the butcher;
screen of the coalscreener . . the mould of the moulder . . the workingknife of
the butcher;
1473
The cylinder press . . the handpress . . the frisket and tympan . . the compositor's
stick and rule,
stick and rule,
1474
The implements for daguerreotyping . . . . the tools of the rigger or grappler or sail-
maker or blockmaker,
maker or blockmaker,
1475
Goods of guttapercha or papiermache . . . . colors and brushes . . . . glaziers' im-
plements,
plements,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 63
1476
The veneer and gluepot . . the confectioner's ornaments . . the decanter and glasses
. . the shears and flatiron;
. . the shears and flatiron;
1477
The awl and kneestrap . . the pint measure and quart measure . . the counter and
stool . . the writingpen of quill or metal;
stool . . the writingpen of quill or metal;
1478
Billiards and tenpins . . . . the ladders and hanging ropes of the gymnasium, and the
manly exercises;
manly exercises;
1479
The designs for wallpapers or oilcloths or carpets . . . . the fancies for goods for
women . . . . the bookbinder's stamps;
women . . . . the bookbinder's stamps;
1480
Leatherdressing, coachmaking, boilermaking, ropetwisting, distilling, signpainting,
limeburning, coopering, cottonpicking,
limeburning, coopering, cottonpicking,
1481
The walkingbeam of the steam-engine . . the throttle and governors, and the up and
down rods,
down rods,
1482
Stavemachines and plainingmachines . . . . the cart of the carman . . the omnibus . .
the ponderous dray;
the ponderous dray;
1483
The snowplough and two engines pushing it . . . . the ride in the express train of
only one car . . . . the swift go through a howling storm:
only one car . . . . the swift go through a howling storm:
1484
The bearhunt or coonhunt . . . . the bonfire of shavings in the open lot in the city
. . the crowd of children watching;
. . the crowd of children watching;
1485
The blows of the fighting-man . . the upper cut and one-two-three;
1486
The shopwindows . . . . the coffins in the sexton's wareroom . . . . the fruit on the
fruitstand . . . . the beef on the butcher's stall,
fruitstand . . . . the beef on the butcher's stall,
1487
The bread and cakes in the bakery . . . . the white and red pork in the pork-store;
1488
The milliner's ribbons . . the dressmaker's patterns . . . . the tea-table . . the home-
made sweetmeats:
made sweetmeats:
1489
The column of wants in the one-cent paper . . the news by telegraph . . . . the
amusements and operas and shows:
amusements and operas and shows:
1490
The cotton and woolen and linen you wear . . . . the money you make and spend;
1491
Your room and bedroom . . . . your piano-forte . . . . the stove and cookpans,
1492
The house you live in . . . . the rent . . . . the other tenants . . . . the deposite in the
savings-bank . . . . the trade at the grocery,
savings-bank . . . . the trade at the grocery,
1493
The pay on Saturday night . . . . the going home, and the purchases;
1494
In them the heft of the heaviest . . . . in them far more than you estimated, and far
less also,
less also,
1495
In them, not yourself . . . . you and your soul enclose all things, regardless of estima-
tion,
tion,
1496
In them your themes and hints and provokers . . if not, the whole earth has no
themes or hints or provokers, and never had.
themes or hints or provokers, and never had.
1497
I do not affirm what you see beyond is futile . . . . I do not advise you to stop,
1498
I do not say leadings you thought great are not great,
1499
But I say that none lead to greater or sadder or happier than those lead to.
1500
Will you seek afar off? You surely come back at last,
1501
In things best known to you finding the best or as good as the best,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
64 Leaves of Grass.
1502
In folks nearest to you finding also the sweetest and strongest and lovingest,
1503
Happiness not in another place, but this place . . not for another hour, but this hour,
1504
Man in the first you see or touch . . . . always in your friend or brother or nighest
neighbor . . . . Woman in your mother or lover or wife,
neighbor . . . . Woman in your mother or lover or wife,
1505
And all else thus far known giving place to men and women.
1506
When the psalm sings instead of the singer,
1507
When the script preaches instead of the preacher,
1508
When the pulpit descends and goes instead of the carver that carved the supporting
desk,
desk,
1509
When the sacred vessels or the bits of the eucharist, or the lath and plast, procreate
as effectually as the young silversmiths or bakers, or the masons in their
overalls,
as effectually as the young silversmiths or bakers, or the masons in their
overalls,
1510
When a university course convinces like a slumbering woman and child convince,
1511
When the minted gold in the vault smiles like the nightwatchman's daughter,
1512
When warrantee deeds loafe in chairs opposite and are my friendly companions,
1513
I intend to reach them my hand and make as much of them as I do of men and
women.
women.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass.
—————
1514
TO think of time . . . . to think through the retrospection,
1515
To think of today . . and the ages continued henceforward.
1516
Have you guessed you yourself would not continue? Have you dreaded those
earth-beetles?
earth-beetles?
1517
Have you feared the future would be nothing to you?
1518
Is today nothing? Is the beginningless past nothing?
1519
If the future is nothing they are just as surely nothing.
1520
To think that the sun rose in the east . . . . that men and women were flexible and
real and alive . . . . that every thing was real and alive;
real and alive . . . . that every thing was real and alive;
1521
To think that you and I did not see feel think nor bear our part,
1522
To think that we are now here and bear our part.
1523
Not a day passes . . not a minute or second without an accouchement;
1524
Not a day passes . . not a minute or second without a corpse.
1525
When the dull nights are over, and the dull days also,
1526
When the soreness of lying so much in bed is over,
1527
When the physician, after long putting off, gives the silent and terrible look for an
answer,
answer,
1528
When the children come hurried and weeping, and the brothers and sisters have
been sent for,
been sent for,
1529
When medicines stand unused on the shelf, and the camphor-smell has pervaded the
rooms,
rooms,
1530
When the faithful hand of the living does not desert the hand of the dying,
1531
When the twitching lips press lightly on the forehead of the dying,
1532
When the breath ceases and the pulse of the heart ceases,
1533
Then the corpse-limbs stretch on the bed, and the living look upon them,
1534
They are palpable as the living are palpable.
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66 Leaves of Grass.
1535
The living look upon the corpse with their eyesight,
1536
But without eyesight lingers a different living and looks curiously on the corpse.
1537
To think that the rivers will come to flow, and the snow fall, and fruits ripen . . and
act upon others as upon us now . . . . yet not act upon us;
act upon others as upon us now . . . . yet not act upon us;
1538
To think of all these wonders of city and country . . and others taking great interest
in them . . and we taking small interest in them.
in them . . and we taking small interest in them.
1539
To think how eager we are in building our houses,
1540
To think others shall be just as eager . . and we quite indifferent.
1541
I see one building the house that serves him a few years . . . . or seventy or eighty
years at most;
years at most;
1542
I see one building the house that serves him longer than that.
1543
Slowmoving and black lines creep over the whole earth . . . . they never cease . . . .
they are the burial lines,
they are the burial lines,
1544
He that was President was buried, and he that is now President shall surely be
buried.
buried.
1545
Cold dash of waves at the ferrywharf,
1546
Posh and ice in the river . . . . half-frozen mud in the streets,
1547
A gray discouraged sky overhead . . . . the short last daylight of December,
1548
A hearse and stages . . . . other vehicles give place,
1549
The funeral of an old stagedriver . . . . the cortege mostly drivers.
1550
Rapid the trot to the cemetery,
1551
Duly rattles the deathbell . . . . the gate is passed . . . . the grave is halted at . . . .
the living alight . . . . the hearse uncloses,
the living alight . . . . the hearse uncloses,
1552
The coffin is lowered and settled . . . . the whip is laid on the coffin,
1553
The earth is swiftly shovelled in . . . . a minute . . no one moves or speaks . . . . it is
done,
done,
1554
He is decently put away . . . . is there anything more?
1555
He was a goodfellow,
1556
Freemouthed, quicktempered, not badlooking, able to take his own part,
1557
sensitive to a slight, ready with life or death for a friend,
1558
Fond of women, . . played some . . eat hearty and drank hearty,
1559
Had known what it was to be flush . . grew lowspirited toward the last . . sickened
. . was helped by a contribution,
. . was helped by a contribution,
1560
Died aged forty-one years . . and that was his funeral.
1561
Thumb extended or finger uplifted,
1562
Apron, cape, gloves, strap . . . . wetweather clothes . . . . whip carefully chosen . . . .
boss, spotter, starter, and hostler,
boss, spotter, starter, and hostler,
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Leaves of Grass. 67
1563
Somebody loafing on you, or you loafing on somebody . . . . headway . . . . man
before and man behind,
before and man behind,
1564
Good day's work or bad day's work . . . . pet stock or mean stock . . . . first out or
last out . . . . turning in at night,
last out . . . . turning in at night,
1565
To think that these are so much and so nigh to other drivers . . and he there takes
no interest in them.
no interest in them.
1566
The markets, the government, the workingman's wages . . . . to think what account
they are through our nights and days;
they are through our nights and days;
1567
To think that other workingmen will make just as great account of them . . yet we
make little or no account.
make little or no account.
1568
The vulgar and the refined . . . . what you call sin and what you call goodness . . to
think how wide a difference;
think how wide a difference;
1569
To think the difference will still continue to others, yet we lie beyond the difference.
1570
To think how much pleasure there is!
1571
Have you pleasure from looking at the sky? Have you pleasure from poems?
1572
Do you enjoy yourself in the city? or engaged in business? or planning a nomina-
tion and election? or with your wife and family?
tion and election? or with your wife and family?
1573
Or with your mother and sisters? or in womanly housework? or the beautiful ma-
ternal cares?
ternal cares?
1574
These also flow onward to others . . . . you and I flow onward;
1575
But in due time you and I shall take less interest in them.
1576
Your farm and profits and crops . . . . to think how engrossed you are;
1577
To think there will still be farms and profits and crops . . yet for you of what avail?
1578
What will be will be well—for what is is well,
1579
To take interest is well, and not to take interest shall be well.
1580
The sky continues beautiful . . . . the pleasure of men with women shall never be
sated . . nor the pleasure of women with men . . nor the pleasure from poems;
sated . . nor the pleasure of women with men . . nor the pleasure from poems;
1581
The domestic joys, the daily housework or business, the building of houses—they
are not phantasms . . they have weight and form and location;
are not phantasms . . they have weight and form and location;
1582
The farms and profits and crops . . the markets and wages and government . . they
also are not phantasms;
also are not phantasms;
1583
The difference between sin and goodness is no apparition;
1584
The earth is not an echo . . . . man and his life and all the things of his life are well-
considered.
considered.
1585
You are not thrown to the winds . . you gather certainly and safely around yourself,
1586
Yourself! Yourself! Yourself forever and ever!
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
68 Leaves of Grass.
1587
It is not to diffuse you that you were born of your mother and father—it is to
identify you,
identify you,
1588
It is not that you should be undecided, but that you should be decided;
1589
Something long preparing and formless is arrived and formed in you,
1590
You are thenceforth secure, whatever comes or goes.
1591
The threads that were spun are gathered . . . . the weft crosses the warp . . . .
the pattern is systematic.
the pattern is systematic.
1592
The preparations have every one been justified;
1593
The orchestra have tuned their instruments sufficiently . . . . the baton has given the
signal.
signal.
1594
The guest that was coming . . . . he waited long for reasons . . . . he is now housed,
1595
He is one of those who are beautiful and happy . . . . he is one of those that to look
upon and be with is enough.
upon and be with is enough.
1596
The law of the past cannot be eluded.
1597
The law of the present and future cannot be eluded,
1598
The law of the living cannot be eluded . . . . it is eternal,
1599
The law of promotion and transformation cannot be eluded,
1600
The law of heroes and good-doers cannot be eluded,
1601
The law of drunkards and informers and mean persons cannot be eluded.
1602
Slowmoving and black lines go ceaselessly over the earth,
1603
Northerner goes carried and southerner goes carried . . . . and they on the Atlantic
side and they on the Pacific, and they between, and all through the Mississippi
country . . . . and all over the earth.
side and they on the Pacific, and they between, and all through the Mississippi
country . . . . and all over the earth.
1604
The great masters and kosmos are well as they go . . . . the heroes and good-doers
are well,
are well,
1605
The known leaders and inventors and the rich owners and pious and distinguished
may be well,
may be well,
1606
But there is more account than that . . . . there is strict account of all.
1607
The interminable hordes of the ignorant and wicked are not nothing,
1608
The barbarians of Africa and Asia are not nothing,
1609
The common people of Europe are not nothing . . . . the American aborigines are
not nothing,
not nothing,
1610
A zambo or a foreheadless Crowfoot or a Camanche is not nothing,
1611
The infected in the immigrant hospital are not nothing . . . . the murderer or mean
person is not nothing,
person is not nothing,
1612
The perpetual succession of shallow people are not nothing as they go,
1613
The prostitute is not nothing . . . . the mocker of religion is not nothing as he goes.
1614
I shall go with the rest . . . . we have satisfaction:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 69
1615
I have dreamed that we are not to be changed so much . . . . nor the law of us
changed;
changed;
1616
I have dreamed that heroes and good-doers shall be under the present and past law,
1617
And that murderers and drunkards and liars shall be under the present and past law;
1618
For I have dreamed that the law they are under now is enough.
1619
And I have dreamed that the satisfaction is not so much changed . . . . and that there
is no life without satisfaction;
is no life without satisfaction;
1620
What is the earth? what are body and soul without satisfaction?
1621
I shall go with the rest,
1622
We cannot be stopped at a given point . . . . that is no satisfaction;
1623
To show us a good thing or a few good things for a space of time—that is no satis-
faction;
faction;
1624
We must have the indestructible breed of the best, regardless of time.
1625
If otherwise, all these things came but to ashes of dung;
1626
If maggots and rats ended us, then suspicion and treachery and death.
1627
Do you suspect death? If I were to suspect death I should die now,
1628
Do you think I could walk pleasantly and well-suited toward annihilation?
1629
Pleasantly and well-suited I walk,
1630
Whither I walk I cannot define, but I know it is good,
1631
The whole universe indicates that it is good,
1632
The past and the present indicate that it is good.
1633
How beautiful and perfect are the animals! How perfect is my soul!
1634
How perfect the earth, and the minutest thing upon it!
1635
What is called good is perfect, and what is called sin is just as perfect;
1636
The vegetables and minerals are all perfect . . and the imponderable fluids are
perfect;
perfect;
1637
Slowly and surely they have passed on to this, and slowly and surely they will yet
pass on.
pass on.
1638
O my soul! if I realize you I have satisfaction,
1639
Animals and vegetables! if I realize you I have satisfaction,
1640
Laws of the earth and air! if I realize you I have satisfaction.
1641
I cannot define my satisfaction . . yet it is so,
1642
I cannot define my life . . yet it is so.
1643
I swear I see now that every thing has an eternal soul!
1644
The trees have, rooted in the ground . . . . the weeds of the sea have . . . . the
animals.
animals.
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70 Leaves of Grass.
1645
I swear I think there is nothing but immortality!
1646
That the exquisite scheme is for it, and the nebulous float is for it, and the cohering
is for it,
is for it,
1647
And all preparation is for it . . and identity is for it . . and life and death are for it.
Leaves of Grass.
—————
1648
I WANDER all night in my vision,
1649
Stepping with light feet . . . . swiftly and noiselessly stepping and stopping,
1650
Bending with open eyes over the shut eyes of sleepers;
1651
Wandering and confused . . . . lost to myself . . . . ill-assorted . . . . contradictory,
1652
Pausing and gazing and bending and stopping.
1653
How solemn they look there, stretched and still;
1654
How quiet they breathe, the little children in their cradles.
1655
The wretched features of ennuyees, the white features of corpses, the livid faces of
drunkards, the sick-gray faces of onanists,
drunkards, the sick-gray faces of onanists,
1656
The gashed bodies on battlefields, the insane in their strong-doored rooms, the
sacred idiots,
sacred idiots,
1657
The newborn emerging from gates and the dying emerging from gates,
1658
The night pervades them and enfolds them.
1659
The married couple sleep calmly in their bed, he with his palm on the hip of the
wife, and she with her palm on the hip of the husband,
wife, and she with her palm on the hip of the husband,
1660
The sisters sleep lovingly side by side in their bed,
1661
The men sleep lovingly side by side in theirs,
1662
And the mother sleeps with her little child carefully wrapped.
1663
The blind sleep, and the deaf and dumb sleep,
1664
The prisoner sleeps well in the prison . . . . the runaway son sleeps,
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Leaves of Grass. 71
1665
The murderer that is to be hung next day . . . . how does he sleep?
1666
And the murdered person . . . . how does he sleep?
1667
The female that loves unrequited sleeps,
1668
And the male that loves unrequited sleeps;
1669
The head of the moneymaker that plotted all day sleeps,
1670
And the enraged and treacherous dispositions sleep.
1671
I stand with drooping eyes by the worstsuffering and restless,
1672
I pass my hands soothingly to and fro a few inches from them;
1673
The restless sink in their beds . . . . they fitfully sleep.
1674
The earth recedes from me into the night,
1675
I saw that it was beautiful . . . . and I see that what is not the earth is beautiful.
1676
I go from bedside to bedside . . . . I sleep close with the other sleepers, each
in turn;
in turn;
1677
I dream in my dream all the dreams of the other dreamers,
1678
And I become the other dreamers.
1679
I am a dance . . . . Play up there! the fit is whirling me fast.
1680
I am the everlaughing . . . . it is new moon and twilight,
1681
I see the hiding of douceurs . . . . I see nimble ghosts whichever way I look,
1682
Cache and cache again deep in the ground and sea, and where it is neither ground or
sea.
sea.
1683
Well do they do their jobs, those journeymen divine,
1684
Only from me can they hide nothing and would not if they could;
1685
I reckon I am their boss, and they make me a pet besides,
1686
And surround me, and lead me and run ahead when I walk,
1687
And lift their cunning covers and signify me with stretched arms, and resume the
way;
way;
1688
Onward we move, a gay gang of blackguards with mirthshouting music and wild-
flapping pennants of joy.
flapping pennants of joy.
1689
I am the actor and the actress . . . . the voter . . the politician,
1690
The emigrant and the exile . . the criminal that stood in the box,
1691
He who has been famous, and he who shall be famous after today,
1692
The stammerer . . . . the wellformed person . . the wasted or feeble person.
1693
I am she who adorned herself and folded her hair expectantly,
1694
My truant lover has come and it is dark.
1695
Double yourself and receive me darkness,
1696
Receive me and my lover too . . . . he will not let me go without him.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
72 Leaves of Grass.
1697
I roll myself upon you as upon a bed . . . . I resign myself to the dusk.
1698
He whom I call answers me and takes the place of my lover,
1699
He rises with me silently from the bed.
1700
Darkness you are gentler than my lover . . . . his flesh was sweaty and panting,
1701
I feel the hot moisture yet that he left me.
1702
My hands are spread forth . . I pass them in all directions,
1703
I would sound up the shadowy shore to which you are journeying.
1704
Be careful, darkness . . . . already, what was it touched me?
1705
I thought my lover had gone . . . . else darkness and he are one,
1706
I hear the heart-beat . . . . I follow . . I fade away.
1707
O hotcheeked and blushing! O foolish hectic!
1708
O for pity's sake, no one must see me now! . . . . my clothes were stolen while I
was abed,
was abed,
1709
Now I am thrust forth, where shall I run?
1710
Pier that I saw dimly last night when I looked from the windows,
1711
Pier out from the main, let me catch myself with you and stay . . . . I will not chafe
you;
you;
1712
I feel ashamed to go naked about the world,
1713
And am curious to know where my feet stand . . . . and what is this flooding
me, childhood or manhood . . . . and the hunger that crosses the bridge
between.
me, childhood or manhood . . . . and the hunger that crosses the bridge
between.
1714
The cloth laps a first sweet eating and drinking,
1715
Laps life-swelling yolks . . . . laps ear of rose-corn, milky and just ripened:
1716
The white teeth stay, and the boss-tooth advances in darkness,
1717
And liquor is spilled on lips and bosoms by touching glasses, and the best liquor
afterward.
afterward.
1718
I descend my western course . . . . my sinews are flaccid,
1719
Perfume and youth course through me, and I am their wake.
1720
It is my face yellow and wrinkled instead of the old woman's,
1721
I sit low in a strawbottom chair and carefully darn my grandson's stockings.
1722
It is I too . . . . the sleepless widow looking out on the winter midnight,
1723
I see the sparkles of starshine on the icy and pallid earth.
1724
A shroud I see—and I am the shroud . . . . I wrap a body and lie in the coffin;
1725
It is dark here underground . . . . it is not evil or pain here . . . . it is blank here, for
reasons.
reasons.
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Leaves of Grass. 73
1726
It seems to me that everything in the light and air ought to be happy;
1727
Whoever is not in his coffin and the dark grave, let him know he has enough.
1728
I see a beautiful gigantic swimmer swimming naked through the eddies of the sea,
1729
His brown hair lies close and even to his head . . . . he strikes out with courageous
arms . . . . he urges himself with his legs.
arms . . . . he urges himself with his legs.
1730
I see his white body . . . . I see his undaunted eyes;
1731
I hate the swift-running eddies that would dash him headforemost on the rocks.
1732
What are you doing you ruffianly red-trickled waves?
1733
Will you kill the courageous giant? Will you kill him in the prime of his middle age?
1734
Steady and long he struggles;
1735
He is baffled and banged and bruised . . . . he holds out while his strength holds out,
1736
The slapping eddies are spotted with his blood . . . . they bear him away . . . . they
roll him and swing him and turn him:
roll him and swing him and turn him:
1737
His beautiful body is borne in the circling eddies . . . . it is continually bruised on
rocks,
rocks,
1738
Swiftly and out of sight is borne the brave corpse.
1739
I turn but do not extricate myself;
1740
Confused . . . . a pastreading . . . . another, but with darkness yet.
1741
The beach is cut by the razory ice-wind . . . . the wreck-guns sound,
1742
The tempest lulls and the moon comes floundering through the drifts.
1743
I look where the ship helplessly heads end on . . . . I hear the burst as she strikes . .
I hear the howls of dismay . . . . they grow fainter and fainter.
I hear the howls of dismay . . . . they grow fainter and fainter.
1744
I cannot aid with my wringing fingers;
1745
I can but rush to the surf and let it drench me and freeze upon me.
1746
I search with the crowd . . . . not one of the company is washed to us alive;
1747
In the morning I help pick up the dead and lay them in rows in a barn.
1748
Now of the old war-days . . the defeat at Brooklyn;
1749
Washington stands inside the lines . . he stands on the entrenched hills amid a crowd
of officers,
of officers,
1750
His face is cold and damp . . . . he cannot repress the weeping drops . . . . he lifts
the glass perpetually to his eyes . . . . the color is blanched from his cheeks,
the glass perpetually to his eyes . . . . the color is blanched from his cheeks,
1751
He sees the slaughter of the southern braves confided to him by their parents.
1752
The same at last and at last when peace is declared,
1753
He stands in the room of the old tavern . . . . the wellbeloved soldiers all pass
through,
through,
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74 Leaves of Grass.
1754
The officers speechless and slow draw near in their turns,
1755
The chief encircles their necks with his arm and kisses them on the cheek,
1756
He kisses lightly the wet cheeks one after another . . . . he shakes hands and bids
goodbye to the army.
goodbye to the army.
1757
Now I tell what my mother told me today as we sat at dinner together,
1758
Of when she was a nearly grown girl living home with her parents on the old home-
stead.
stead.
1759
A red squaw came one breakfasttime to the old homestead,
1760
On her back she carried a bundle of rushes for rushbottoming chairs;
1761
Her hair straight shiny coarse black and profuse halfenveloped her face,
1762
Her step was free and elastic . . . . her voice sounded exquisitely as she spoke.
1763
My mother looked in delight and amazement at the stranger,
1764
She looked at the beauty of her tallborne face and full and pliant limbs,
1765
The more she looked upon her she loved her,
1766
Never before had she seen such wonderful beauty and purity;
1767
She made her sit on a bench by the jamb of the fireplace . . . . she cooked food for
her,
her,
1768
She had no work to give her but she gave her remembrance and fondness.
1769
The red squaw staid all the forenoon, and toward the middle of the afternoon she
went away;
went away;
1770
O my mother was loth to have her go away,
1771
All the week she thought of her . . . . she watched for her many a month,
1772
She remembered her many a winter and many a summer,
1773
But the red squaw never came nor was heard of there again.
1774
Now Lucifer was not dead . . . . or if he was I am his sorrowful terrible heir;
1775
I have been wronged . . . . I am oppressed . . . . I hate him that oppresses me,
1776
I will either destroy him, or he shall release me.
1777
Damn him! how he does defile me,
1778
How he informs against my brother and sister and takes pay for their blood,
1779
How he laughs when I look down the bend after the steamboat that carries away my
woman.
woman.
1780
Now the vast dusk bulk that is the whale's bulk . . . . it seems mine,
1781
Warily, sportsman! though I lie so sleepy and sluggish, my tap is death.
1782
A show of the summer softness . . . . a contact of something unseen . . . . an amour
of the light and air;
of the light and air;
1783
I am jealous and overwhelmed with friendliness,
1784
And will go gallivant with the light and the air myself,
1785
And have an unseen something to be in contact with them also.
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Leaves of Grass. 75
1786
O love and summer! you are in the dreams and in me,
1787
Autumn and winter are in the dreams . . . . the farmer goes with his thrift,
1788
The droves and crops increase . . . . the barns are wellfilled.
1789
Elements merge in the night . . . . ships make tacks in the dreams . . . . the sailor
sails . . . . the exile returns home,
sails . . . . the exile returns home,
1790
The fugitive returns unharmed . . . . the immigrant is back beyond months and years;
1791
The poor Irishman lives in the simple house of his childhood, with the wellknown
neighbors and faces,
neighbors and faces,
1792
They warmly welcome him . . . . he is barefoot again . . . . he forgets he is welloff;
1793
The Dutchman voyages home, and the Scotchman and Welchman voyage home . .
and the native of the Mediterranean voyages home;
and the native of the Mediterranean voyages home;
1794
To every port of England and France and Spain enter wellfilled ships;
1795
The Swiss foots it toward his hills . . . . the Prussian goes his way, and the
Hungarian his way, and the Pole goes his way,
Hungarian his way, and the Pole goes his way,
1796
The Swede returns, and the Dane and Norwegian return.
1797
The homeward bound and the outward bound,
1798
The beautiful lost swimmer, the ennuyee, the onanist, the female that loves unre-
quited, the moneymaker,
quited, the moneymaker,
1799
The actor and actress . . those through with their parts and those waiting to
commence,
commence,
1800
The affectionate boy, the husband and wife, the voter, the nominee that is chosen
and the nominee that has failed,
and the nominee that has failed,
1801
The great already known, and the great anytime after to day,
1802
The stammerer, the sick, the perfectformed, the homely,
1803
The criminal that stood in the box, the judge that sat and sentenced him, the fluent
lawyers, the jury, the audience,
lawyers, the jury, the audience,
1804
The laugher and weeper, the dancer, the midnight widow, the red squaw,
1805
The consumptive, the erysipalite, the idiot, he that is wronged,
1806
The antipodes, and every one between this and them in the dark,
1807
I swear they are averaged now . . . . one is no better than the other,
1808
The night and sleep have likened them and restored them.
1809
I swear they are all beautiful,
1810
Every one that sleeps is beautiful . . . . every thing in the dim night is beautiful,
1811
The wildest and bloodiest is over and all is peace.
1812
Peace is always beautiful,
1813
The myth of heaven indicates peace and night.
1814
The myth of heaven indicates the soul;
1815
The soul is always beautiful . . . . it appears more or it appears less . . . . it comes or
lags behind,
lags behind,
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76 Leaves of Grass.
1816
It comes from its embowered garden and looks pleasantly on itself and encloses the
world;
world;
1817
Perfect and clean the genitals previously jetting, and perfect and clean the womb
cohering,
cohering,
1818
The head wellgrown and proportioned and plumb, and the bowels and joints
proportioned and plumb.
proportioned and plumb.
1819
The soul is always beautiful,
1820
The universe is duly in order . . . . every thing is in its place,
1821
What is arrived is in its place, and what waits is in its place;
1822
The twisted skull waits . . . . the watery or rotten blood waits,
1823
The child of the glutton or venerealee waits long, and the child of the drunkard
waits long, and the drunkard himself waits long,
waits long, and the drunkard himself waits long,
1824
The sleepers that lived and died wait . . . . the far advanced are to go on in their
turns, and the far behind are to go on in their turns,
turns, and the far behind are to go on in their turns,
1825
The diverse shall be no less diverse, but they shall flow and unite . . . . they unite
now.
now.
1826
The sleepers are very beautiful as they lie unclothed,
1827
They flow hand in hand over the whole earth from east to west as they lie un-
clothed;
clothed;
1828
The Asiatic and African are hand in hand . . . . the European and American are
hand in hand,
hand in hand,
1829
Learned and unlearned are hand in hand . . and male and female are hand in hand;
1830
The bare arm of the girl crosses the bare breast of her lover . . . . they press close
without lust . . . . his lips press her neck,
without lust . . . . his lips press her neck,
1831
The father holds his grown or ungrown son in his arms with measureless love . . . .
and the son holds the father in his arms with measureless love,
and the son holds the father in his arms with measureless love,
1832
The white hair of the mother shines on the white wrist of the daughter,
1833
The breath of the boy goes with the breath of the man . . . . friend is inarmed by
friend,
friend,
1834
The scholar kisses the teacher and the teacher kisses the scholar . . . . the wronged
is made right,
is made right,
1835
The call of the slave is one with the master's call . . and the master salutes the slave,
1836
The felon steps forth from the prison . . . . the insane becomes sane . . . . the suffer-
ing of sick persons is relieved,
ing of sick persons is relieved,
1837
The sweatings and fevers stop . . the throat that was unsound is sound . . the lungs
of the consumptive are resumed . . the poor distressed head is free,
of the consumptive are resumed . . the poor distressed head is free,
1838
The joints of the rheumatic move as smoothly as ever, and smoother than ever,
1839
Stiflings and passages open . . . . the paralysed become supple,
1840
The swelled and convulsed and congested awake to themselves in condition,
1841
They pass the invigoration of the night and the chemistry of the night and awake.
1842
I too pass from the night;
1843
I stay awhile away O night, but I return to you again and love you;
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Leaves of Grass. 77
1844
Why should I be afraid to trust myself to you?
1845
I am not afraid . . . . I have been well brought forward by you;
1846
I love the rich running day, but I do not desert her in whom I lay so long:
1847
I know not how I came of you, and I know not where I go with you . . . . but I
know I came well and shall go well.
know I came well and shall go well.
1848
I will stop only a time with the night . . . . and rise betimes.
1849
I will duly pass the day O my mother and duly return to you;
1850
Not you will yield forth the dawn again more surely than you will yield forth me
again,
again,
1851
Not the womb yields the babe in its time more surely than I shall be yielded from
you in my time.
you in my time.
Leaves of Grass.
—————
1852
THE bodies of men and women engirth me, and I engirth them,
1853
They will not let me off nor I them till I go with them and respond to them
and love them.
and love them.
1854
Was it dreamed whether those who corrupted their own live bodies could conceal
themselves?
themselves?
1855
And whether those who defiled the living were as bad as they who defiled the
dead?
dead?
1856
The expression of the body of man or woman balks account,
1857
The male is perfect and that of the female is perfect.
1858
The expression of a wellmade man appears not only in his face,
1859
It is in his limbs and joints also . . . . it is curiously in the joints of his hips and wrists,
1860
It is in his walk . . the carriage of his neck . . the flex of his waist and knees . . . .
dress does not hide him,
dress does not hide him,
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78 Leaves of Grass.
1861
The strong sweet supple quality he has strikes through the cotton and flannel;
1862
To see him pass conveys as much as the best poem . . perhaps more,
1863
You linger to see his back and the back of his neck and shoulderside.
1864
The sprawl and fulness of babes . . . . the bosoms and heads of women . . . . the
folds of their dress . . . . their style as we pass in the street . . . . the contour of
their shape downwards;
folds of their dress . . . . their style as we pass in the street . . . . the contour of
their shape downwards;
1865
The swimmer naked in the swimmingbath . . seen as he swims through the salt
transparent greenshine, or lies on his back and rolls silently with the heave of
the water;
transparent greenshine, or lies on his back and rolls silently with the heave of
the water;
1866
Framers bare-armed framing a house . . hoisting the beams in their places . . or
using the mallet and mortising-chisel,
using the mallet and mortising-chisel,
1867
The bending forward and backward of rowers in rowboats . . . . the horseman in his
saddle;
saddle;
1868
Girls and mothers and housekeepers in all their exquisite offices,
1869
The group of laborers seated at noontime with their open dinnerkettles, and their
wives waiting,
wives waiting,
1870
The female soothing a child . . . . the farmer's daughter in the garden or cowyard,
1871
The woodman rapidly swinging his axe in the woods . . . . the young fellow hoeing
corn . . . . the sleighdriver guiding his six horses through the crowd,
corn . . . . the sleighdriver guiding his six horses through the crowd,
1872
The wrestle of wrestlers . . two apprentice-boys, quite grown, lusty, goodnatured,
nativeborn, out on the vacant lot at sundown after work,
nativeborn, out on the vacant lot at sundown after work,
1873
The coats vests and caps thrown down . . the embrace of love and resistance,
1874
The upperhold and underhold—the hair rumpled over and blinding the eyes;
1875
The march of firemen in their own costumes—the play of the masculine muscle
through cleansetting trowsers and waistbands,
through cleansetting trowsers and waistbands,
1876
The slow return from the fire . . . . the pause when the bell strikes suddenly again—
the listening on the alert,
the listening on the alert,
1877
The natural perfect and varied attitudes . . . . the bent head, the curved neck, the
counting:
counting:
1878
Suchlike I love . . . . I loosen myself and pass freely . . . . and am at the mother's
breast with the little child,
breast with the little child,
1879
And swim with the swimmer, and wrestle with wrestlers, and march in line with the
firemen, and pause and listen and count.
firemen, and pause and listen and count.
1880
I knew a man . . . . he was a common farmer . . . . he was the father of five sons . . .
and in them were the fathers of sons . . . and in them were the fathers of sons.
and in them were the fathers of sons . . . and in them were the fathers of sons.
1881
This man was of wonderful vigor and calmness and beauty of person;
1882
The shape of his head, the richness and breadth of his manners, the pale yellow
and white of his hair and beard, the immeasurable meaning of his black eyes,
and white of his hair and beard, the immeasurable meaning of his black eyes,
1883
These I used to go and visit him to see . . . . He was wise also,
1884
He was six feet tall . . . . he was over eighty years old . . . . his sons were massive
clean bearded tanfaced and handsome,
clean bearded tanfaced and handsome,
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Leaves of Grass. 79
1885
They and his daughters loved him . . . all who saw him loved him . . . they did not
love him by allowance . . . they loved him with personal love;
love him by allowance . . . they loved him with personal love;
1886
He drank water only . . . . the blood showed like scarlet through the clear brown
skin of his face;
skin of his face;
1887
He was a frequent gunner and fisher . . . he sailed his boat himself . . . he had a fine
one presented to him by a shipjoiner . . . . he had fowling-pieces, presented to
him by men that loved him;
one presented to him by a shipjoiner . . . . he had fowling-pieces, presented to
him by men that loved him;
1888
When he went with his five sons and many grandsons to hunt or fish you would pick
him out as the most beautiful and vigorous of the gang,
him out as the most beautiful and vigorous of the gang,
1889
You would wish long and long to be with him . . . . you would wish to sit by him in
the boat that you and he might touch each other.
the boat that you and he might touch each other.
1890
I have perceived that to be with those I like is enough,
1891
To stop in company with the rest at evening is enough,
1892
To be surrounded by beautiful curious breathing laughing flesh is enough,
1893
To pass among them . . to touch any one . . . . to rest my arm ever so lightly round
his or her neck for a moment . . . . what is this then?
his or her neck for a moment . . . . what is this then?
1894
I do not ask any more delight . . . . I swim in it as in a sea.
1895
There is something in staying close to men and women and looking on them and in
the contact and odor of them that pleases the soul well,
the contact and odor of them that pleases the soul well,
1896
All things please the soul, but these please the soul well.
1897
This is the female form,
1898
A divine nimbus exhales from it from head to foot,
1899
It attracts with fierce undeniable attraction,
1900
I am drawn by its breath as if I were no more than a helpless vapor . . . . all falls
aside but myself and it,
aside but myself and it,
1901
Books, art, religion, time . . the visible and solid earth . . the atmosphere and the
fringed clouds . . what was expected of heaven or feared of hell are now
consumed,
fringed clouds . . what was expected of heaven or feared of hell are now
consumed,
1902
Mad filaments, ungovernable shoots play out of it . . the response likewise ungovern-
able,
able,
1903
Hair, bosom, hips, bend of legs, negligent falling hands—all diffused . . . . mine too
diffused,
diffused,
1904
Ebb stung by the flow, and flow stung by the ebb . . . . loveflesh swelling and
deliciously aching,
deliciously aching,
1905
Limitless limpid jets of love hot and enormous . . . . quivering jelly of love . . . white-
blow and delirious juice,
blow and delirious juice,
1906
Bridegroom-night of love working surely and softly into the prostrate dawn,
1907
Undulating into the willing and yielding day,
1908
Lost in the cleave of the clasping and sweetfleshed day.
1909
This is the nucleus . . . after the child is born of woman the man is born of woman,
1910
This is the bath of birth . . . this is the merge of small and large and the outlet again.
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80 Leaves of Grass.
1911
Be not ashamed women . . your privilege encloses the rest . . it is the exit of the rest,
1912
You are the gates of the body and you are the gates of the soul.
1913
The female contains all qualities and tempers them . . . . she is in her place . . . .
she moves with perfect balance,
she moves with perfect balance,
1914
She is all things duly veiled . . . . she is both passive and active . . . . she is to con-
ceive daughters as well as sons and sons as well as daughters.
ceive daughters as well as sons and sons as well as daughters.
1915
As I see my soul reflected in nature . . . . as I see through a mist one with inexpress-
ible completeness and beauty . . . . see the bent head and arms folded over the
breast . . . . the female I see,
ible completeness and beauty . . . . see the bent head and arms folded over the
breast . . . . the female I see,
1916
I see the bearer of the great fruit which is immortality . . . . the good thereof is
not tasted by roues, and never can be.
not tasted by roues, and never can be.
1917
The male is not less the soul, nor more . . . . he too is in his place,
1918
He too is all qualities . . . . he is action and power . . . . the flush of the known
universe is in him,
universe is in him,
1919
Scorn becomes him well and appetite and defiance become him well,
1920
The fiercest largest passions . . bliss that is utmost and sorrow that is utmost be-
come him well . . . . pride is for him,
come him well . . . . pride is for him,
1921
The fullspread pride of man is calming and excellent to the soul;
1922
Knowledge becomes him . . . . he likes it always . . . . he brings everything to the
test of himself,
test of himself,
1923
Whatever the survey . . whatever the sea and the sail, he strikes soundings at last
only here,
only here,
1924
Where else does he strike soundings except here?
1925
The man's body is sacred and the woman's body is sacred . . . . it is no matter who,
1926
Is it a slave? Is it one of the dullfaced immigrants just landed on the wharf?
1927
Each belongs here or anywhere just as much as the welloff . . . . just as much as
you,
you,
1928
Each has his or her place in the procession.
1929
All is a procession,
1930
The universe is a procession with measured and beautiful motion.
1931
Do you know so much that you call the slave or the dullface ignorant?
1932
Do you suppose you have a right to a good sight . . . and he or she has no
right to a sight?
right to a sight?
1933
Do you think matter has cohered together from its diffused float, and the soil is
on the surface and water runs and vegetation sprouts for you . . and not for
him and her?
on the surface and water runs and vegetation sprouts for you . . and not for
him and her?
1934
A slave at auction!
1935
I help the auctioneer . . . . the sloven does not half know his business.
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Leaves of Grass. 81
1936
Gentlemen look on this curious creature,
1937
Whatever the bids of the bidders they cannot be high enough for him,
1938
For him the globe lay preparing quintillions of years without one animal or plant,
1939
For him the revolving cycles truly and steadily rolled.
1940
In that head the allbaffling brain,
1941
In it and below it the making of the attributes of heroes.
1942
Examine these limbs, red black or white . . . . they are very cunning in tendon and
nerve;
nerve;
1943
They shall be stript that you may see them.
1944
Exquisite senses, lifelit eyes, pluck, volition,
1945
Flakes of breastmuscle, pliant backbone and neck, flesh not flabby, goodsized arms
and legs,
and legs,
1946
And wonders within there yet.
1947
Within there runs his blood . . . . the same old blood . . the same red running blood;
1948
There swells and jets his heart . . . . There all passions and desires . . all reachings
and aspirations:
and aspirations:
1949
Do you think they are not there because they are not expressed in parlors and
lecture-rooms?
lecture-rooms?
1950
This is not only one man . . . . he is the father of those who shall be fathers in their
turns,
turns,
1951
In him the start of populous states and rich republics,
1952
Of him countless immortal lives with countless embodiments and enjoyments.
1953
How do you know who shall come from the offspring of his offspring through the
centuries?
centuries?
1954
Who might you find you have come from yourself if you could trace back through
the centuries?
the centuries?
1955
A woman at auction,
1956
She too is not only herself . . . . she is the teeming mother of mothers,
1957
She is the bearer of them that shall grow and be mates to the mothers.
1958
Her daughters or their daughters' daughters . . who knows who shall mate with
them?
them?
1959
Who knows through the centuries what heroes may come from them?
1960
In them and of them natal love . . . . in them the divine mystery . . . . the same old
beautiful mystery.
beautiful mystery.
1961
Have you ever loved a woman?
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82 Leaves of Grass.
1962
Your mother . . . . is she living? . . . . Have you been much with her? and has she
been much with you?
been much with you?
1963
Do you not see that these are exactly the same to all in all nations and times all
over the earth?
over the earth?
1964
If life and the soul are sacred the human body is sacred;
1965
And the glory and sweet of a man is the token of manhood untainted,
1966
And in man or woman a clean strong firmfibred body is beautiful as the most
beautiful face.
beautiful face.
1967
Have you seen the fool that corrupted his own live body? or the fool that corrupted
her own live body?
her own live body?
1968
For they do not conceal themselves, and cannot conceal themselves.
1969
Who degrades or defiles the living human body is cursed,
1970
Who degrades or defiles the body of the dead is not more cursed.
Leaves of Grass.
—————
1971
SAUNTERING the pavement or riding the country byroad here then are
faces,
faces,
1972
Faces of friendship, precision, caution, suavity, ideality,
1973
The spiritual prescient face, the always welcome common benevolent face,
1974
The face of the singing of music, the grand faces of natural lawyers and judges
broad at the backtop,
broad at the backtop,
1975
The faces of hunters and fishers, bulged at the brows . . . . the shaved blanched
faces of orthodox citizens,
faces of orthodox citizens,
1976
The pure extravagant yearning questioning artist's face,
1977
The welcome ugly face of some beautiful soul . . . . the handsome detested or
despised face,
despised face,
1978
The sacred faces of infants . . . . the illuminated face of the mother of many children,
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Leaves of Grass. 83
1979
The face of an amour . . . . the face of veneration,
1980
The face as of a dream . . . . the face of an immobile rock,
1981
The face withdrawn of its good and bad . . a castrated face,
1982
A wild hawk . . his wings clipped by the clipper,
1983
A stallion that yielded at last to the thongs and knife of the gelder.
1984
Sauntering the pavement or crossing the ceaseless ferry, here then are faces;
1985
I see them and complain not and am content with all.
1986
Do you suppose I could be content with all if I thought them their own finale?
1987
This now is too lamentable a face for a man;
1988
Some abject louse asking leave to be . . cringing for it,
1989
Some milknosed maggot blessing what lets it wrig to its hole.
1990
This face is a dog's snout sniffing for garbage;
1991
Snakes nest in that mouth . . I hear the sibilant threat.
1992
This face is a haze more chill than the arctic sea,
1993
Its sleepy and wobbling icebergs crunch as they go.
1994
This is a face of bitter herbs . . . . this an emetic . . . . they need no label,
1995
And more of the drugshelf . . laudanum, caoutchouc, or hog's lard.
1996
This face is an epilepsy advertising and doing business . . . . its wordless tongue
gives out the unearthly cry,
gives out the unearthly cry,
1997
Its veins down the neck distend . . . . its eyes roll till they show nothing but their
whites,
whites,
1998
Its teeth grit . . the palms of the hands are cut by the turned-in nails,
1999
The man falls struggling and foaming to the ground while he speculates well.
2000
This face is bitten by vermin and worms,
2001
And this is some murderer's knife with a halfpulled scabbard.
2002
This face owes to the sexton his dismalest fee,
2003
An unceasing deathbell tolls there.
2004
Those are really men! . . . . the bosses and tufts of the great round globe!
2005
Features of my equals, would you trick me with your creased and cadaverous
march?
march?
2006
Well then you cannot trick me.
2007
I see your rounded never-erased flow,
2008
I see neath the rims of your haggard and mean disguises.
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84 Leaves of Grass.
2009
Splay and twist as you like . . . . poke with the tangling fores of fishes or rats,
2010
You'll be unmuzzled . . . . you certainly will.
2011
I saw the face of the most smeared and slobbering idiot they had at the asylum,
2012
And I knew for my consolation what they knew not;
2013
I knew of the agents that emptied and broke my brother,
2014
The same wait to clear the rubbish from the fallen tenement;
2015
And I shall look again in a score or two of ages,
2016
And I shall meet the real landlord perfect and unharmed, every inch as good as
myself.
myself.
2017
The Lord advances and yet advances:
2018
Always the shadow in front . . . . always the reached hand bringing up the laggards.
2019
Out of this face emerge banners and horses . . . . O superb! . . . . I see what is
coming,
coming,
2020
I see the high pioneercaps . . . . I see the staves of runners clearing the way,
2021
I hear victorious drums.
2022
This face is a lifeboat;
2023
This is the face commanding and bearded . . . . it asks no odds of the rest;
2024
This face is flavored fruit ready for eating;
2025
This face of a healthy honest boy is the programme of all good.
2026
These faces bear testimony slumbering or awake,
2027
They show their descent from the Master himself.
2028
Off the word I have spoken I except not one . . . . red white or black, all are deific,
2029
In each house is the ovum . . . . it comes forth after a thousand years.
2030
Spots or cracks at the windows do not disturb me,
2031
Tall and sufficient stand behind and make signs to me;
2032
I read the promise and patiently wait.
2033
This is a fullgrown lily's face,
2034
She speaks to the limber-hip'd man near the garden pickets,
2035
Come here, she blushingly cries . . . . Come nigh to me limber-hip'd man and give me
your finger and thumb,
your finger and thumb,
2036
Stand at my side till I lean as high as I can upon you,
2037
Fill me with albescent honey . . . . bend down to me,
2038
Rub to me with your chafing beard . . rub to my breast and shoulders.
2039
The old face of the mother of many children:
2040
Whist! I am fully content.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 85
2041
Lulled and late is the smoke of the Sabbath morning,
2042
It hangs low over the rows of trees by the fences,
2043
It hangs thin by the sassafras, the wildcherry and the catbrier under them.
2044
I saw the rich ladies in full dress at the soiree,
2045
I heard what the run of poets were saying so long,
2046
Heard who sprang in crimson youth from the white froth and the water-blue.
2047
Behold a woman!
2048
She looks out from her quaker cap . . . . her face is clearer and more beautiful than
the sky.
the sky.
2049
She sits in an armchair under the shaded porch of the farmhouse,
2050
The sun just shines on her old white head.
2051
Her ample gown is of creamhued linen,
2052
Her grandsons raised the flax, and her granddaughters spun it with the distaff and
the wheel.
the wheel.
2053
The melodious character of the earth!
2054
The finish beyond which philosophy cannot go and does not wish to go!
2055
The justified mother of men!
2056
A YOUNG man came to me with a message from his brother,
2057
How should the young man know the whether and when of his brother?
2058
Tell him to send me the signs.
2059
And I stood before the young man face to face, and took his right hand in my left
hand and his left hand in my right hand,
hand and his left hand in my right hand,
2060
And I answered for his brother and for men . . . . and I answered for the poet, and
sent these signs.
sent these signs.
2061
Him all wait for . . . . him all yield up to . . . . his word is decisive and final,
2062
Him they accept . . . . in him lave . . . . in him perceive themselves as amid light,
2063
Him they immerse, and he immerses them.
2064
Beautiful women, the haughtiest nations, laws, the landscape, people and animals,
2065
The profound earth and its attributes, and the unquiet ocean,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
86 Leaves of Grass.
2066
All enjoyments and properties, and money, and whatever money will buy,
2067
The best farms . . . . others toiling and planting, and he unavoidably reaps,
2068
The noblest and costliest cities . . . . others grading and building, and he domiciles
there;
there;
2069
Nothing for any one but what is for him . . . . near and far are for him,
2070
The ships in the offing . . . . the perpetual shows and marches on land are for him if
they are for any body.
they are for any body.
2071
He puts things in their attitudes,
2072
He puts today out of himself with plasticity and love,
2073
He places his own city, times, reminiscences, parents, brothers and sisters, associ-
ations employment and politics, so that the rest never shame them afterward,
nor assume to command them.
ations employment and politics, so that the rest never shame them afterward,
nor assume to command them.
2074
He is the answerer,
2075
What can be answered he answers, and what cannot be answered he shows how it
cannot be answered.
cannot be answered.
2076
A man is a summons and challenge,
2077
It is vain to skulk . . . . Do you hear that mocking and laughter? Do you hear the
ironical echoes?
ironical echoes?
2078
Books friendships philosophers priests action pleasure pride beat up and down
seeking to give satisfaction;
seeking to give satisfaction;
2079
He indicates the satisfaction, and indicates them that beat up and down also.
2080
Whichever the sex . . . whatever the season or place he may go freshly and gently
and safely by day or by night,
and safely by day or by night,
2081
He has the passkey of hearts . . . . to him the response of the prying of hands on the
knobs.
knobs.
2082
His welcome is universal . . . . the flow of beauty is not more welcome or universal
than he is,
than he is,
2083
The person he favors by day or sleeps with at night is blessed.
2084
Every existence has its idiom . . . . every thing has an idiom and tongue;
2085
He resolves all tongues into his own, and bestows it upon men . . and any man
translates . . and any man translates himself also:
translates . . and any man translates himself also:
2086
One part does not counteract another part . . . . He is the joiner . . he sees how they
join.
join.
2087
He says indifferently and alike, How are you friend? to the President at his levee,
2088
And he says Good day my brother, to Cudge that hoes in the sugarfield;
2089
And both understand him and know that his speech is right.
2090
He walks with perfect ease in the capitol,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 87
2091
He walks among the Congress . . . . and one representative says to another, Here is
our equal appearing and new.
our equal appearing and new.
2092
Then the mechanics take him for a mechanic,
2093
And the soldiers suppose him to be a captain . . . . and the sailors that he has
followed the sea,
followed the sea,
2094
And the authors take him for an author . . . . and the artists for an artist,
2095
And the laborers perceive he could labor with them and love them;
2096
No matter what the work is, that he is one to follow it or has followed it,
2097
No matter what the nation, that he might find his brothers and sisters there.
2098
The English believe he comes of their English stock,
2099
A Jew to the Jew he seems . . . . a Russ to the Russ . . . . usual and near . .
removed from none.
removed from none.
2100
Whoever he looks at in the traveler's coffeehouse claims him,
2101
The Italian or Frenchman is sure, and the German is sure, and the Spaniard is
sure . . . . and the island Cuban is sure.
sure . . . . and the island Cuban is sure.
2102
The engineer, the deckhand on the great lakes or on the Mississippi or St Law-
rence or Sacramento or Hudson or Delaware claims him.
rence or Sacramento or Hudson or Delaware claims him.
2103
The gentleman of perfect blood acknowledges his perfect blood,
2104
The insulter, the prostitute, the angry person, the beggar, see themselves in the ways
of him . . . . he strangely transmutes them,
of him . . . . he strangely transmutes them,
2105
They are not vile any more . . . . they hardly know themselves, they are so grown.
2106
You think it would be good to be the writer of melodious verses,
2107
Well it would be good to be the writer of melodious verses;
2108
But what are verses beyond the flowing character you could have? . . . . or
beyond beautiful manners and behaviour?
beyond beautiful manners and behaviour?
2109
Or beyond one manly or affectionate deed of an apprenticeboy? . . or old woman? . .
or man that has been in prison or is likely to be in prison?
or man that has been in prison or is likely to be in prison?
Related Manuscripts
[Untitled] [2]
("Europe, the 72d and 73d Years of These States")
[Untitled] [2]
("Europe, the 72d and 73d Years of These States")
- duk.00260 (low)
2110
SUDDENLY out of its stale and drowsy lair, the lair of slaves,
2111
Like lightning Europe le'pt forth . . . . half startled at itself,
2112
Its feet upon the ashes and the rags . . . . Its hands tight to the throats of kings.
2113
O hope and faith! O aching close of lives! O many a sickened heart!
2114
Turn back unto this day, and make yourselves afresh.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
88 Leaves of Grass.
2115
And you, paid to defile the People . . . . you liars mark:
2116
Not for numberless agonies, murders, lusts,
2117
For court thieving in its manifold mean forms,
2118
Worming from his simplicity the poor man's wages;
2119
For many a promise sworn by royal lips, And broken, and laughed at in the breaking,
2120
Then in their power not for all these did the blows strike of personal revenge . . or
the heads of the nobles fall;
the heads of the nobles fall;
2121
The People scorned the ferocity of kings.
2122
But the sweetness of mercy brewed bitter destruction, and the frightened rulers come
back:
back:
2123
Each comes in state with his train . . . . hangman, priest and tax-gatherer . . . .
soldier, lawyer, jailer and sycophant.
soldier, lawyer, jailer and sycophant.
2124
Yet behind all, lo, a Shape,
2125
Vague as the night, draped interminably, head front and form in scarlet folds,
2126
Whose face and eyes none may see,
2127
Out of its robes only this . . . . the red robes, lifted by the arm,
2128
One finger pointed high over the top, like the head of a snake appears.
2129
Meanwhile corpses lie in new-made graves . . . . bloody corpses of young men:
2130
The rope of the gibbet hangs heavily . . . . the bullets of princes are flying . . . .
the creatures of power laugh aloud,
the creatures of power laugh aloud,
2131
And all these things bear fruits . . . . and they are good.
2132
Those corpses of young men,
2133
Those martyrs that hang from the gibbets . . . those hearts pierced by the gray lead,
2134
Cold and motionless as they seem . . live elsewhere with unslaughter'd vitality.
2135
They live in other young men, O kings,
2136
They live in brothers, again ready to defy you:
2137
They were purified by death . . . . They were taught and exalted.
2138
Not a grave of the murdered for freedom but grows seed for freedom . . . . in its
turn to bear seed,
turn to bear seed,
2139
Which the winds carry afar and re-sow, and the rains and the snows nourish.
2140
Not a disembodied spirit can the weapons of tyrants let loose,
2141
But it stalks invisibly over the earth . . whispering counseling cautioning.
2142
Liberty let others despair of you . . . . I never despair of you.
2143
Is the house shut? Is the master away?
2144
Nevertheless be ready . . . . be not weary of watching,
2145
He will soon return . . . . his messengers come anon.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 89
Related Manuscripts
[Untitled] [3]
("A Boston Ballad")
[Untitled] [3]
("A Boston Ballad")
- No manuscripts found
2146
CLEAR the way there Jonathan!
2147
Way for the President's marshal! Way for the government cannon!
2148
Way for the federal foot and dragoons . . . . and the phantoms afterward.
2149
I rose this morning early to get betimes in Boston town;
2150
Here's a good place at the corner . . . . I must stand and see the show.
2151
I love to look on the stars and stripes . . . . I hope the fifes will play Yankee Doodle.
2152
How bright shine the foremost with cutlasses,
2153
Every man holds his revolver . . . . marching stiff through Boston town.
2154
A fog follows . . . . antiques of the same come limping,
2155
Some appear wooden-legged and some appear bandaged and bloodless.
2156
Why this is a show! It has called the dead out of the earth,
2157
The old graveyards of the hills have hurried to see;
2158
Uncountable phantoms gather by flank and rear of it,
2159
Cocked hats of mothy mould and crutches made of mist,
2160
Arms in slings and old men leaning on young men's shoulders.
2161
What troubles you, Yankee phantoms? What is all this chattering of bare gums?
2162
Does the ague convulse your limbs? Do you mistake your crutches for firelocks,
and level them?
and level them?
2163
If you blind your eyes with tears you will not see the President's marshal,
2164
If you groan such groans you might balk the government cannon.
2165
For shame old maniacs! . . . . Bring down those tossed arms, and let your white
hair be;
hair be;
2166
Here gape your smart grandsons . . . . their wives gaze at them from the windows,
2167
See how well-dressed . . . . see how orderly they conduct themselves.
2168
Worse and worse . . . . Can't you stand it? Are you retreating?
2169
Is this hour with the living too dead for you?
2170
Retreat then! Pell-mell! . . . . Back to the hills, old limpers!
2171
I do not think you belong here anyhow.
2172
But there is one thing that belongs here . . . . Shall I tell you what it is, gentlemen of
Boston?
Boston?
2173
I will whisper it to the Mayor . . . . he shall send a committee to England,
2174
They shall get a grant from the Parliament, and go with a cart to the royal vault.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
90 Leaves of Grass.
2175
Dig out King George's coffin . . . . unwrap him quick from the graveclothes . . . .
box up his bones for a journey:
box up his bones for a journey:
2176
Find a swift Yankee clipper . . . . here is freight for you blackbellied clipper,
2177
Up with your anchor! shake out your sails! . . . . steer straight toward Boston bay.
2178
Now call the President's marshal again, and bring out the government cannon,
2179
And fetch home the roarers from Congress, and make another procession and guard
it with foot and dragoons.
it with foot and dragoons.
2180
Here is a centrepiece for them:
2181
Look! all orderly citizens . . . . look from the windows women.
2182
The committee open the box and set up the regal ribs and glue those that will not
stay,
stay,
2183
And clap the skull on top of the ribs, and clap a crown on top of the skull.
2184
You have got your revenge old buster! . . . . The crown is come to its own and more
than its own.
than its own.
2185
Stick your hands in your pockets Jonathan . . . . you are a made man from this day,
2186
You are mighty cute . . . . and here is one of your bargains.
2187
THERE was a child went forth every day,
2188
And the first object he looked upon and received with wonder or pity or love
or dread, that object he became,
or dread, that object he became,
2189
And that object became part of him for the day or a certain part of the day . . . . or
for many years or stretching cycles of years.
for many years or stretching cycles of years.
2190
The early lilacs became part of this child,
2191
And grass, and white and red morningglories, and white and red clover, and the song
of the phœbe-bird,
of the phœbe-bird,
2192
And the March-born lambs, and the sow's pink-faint litter, and the mare's foal, and
the cow's calf, and the noisy brood of the barnyard or by the mire of the pond-
side . . and the fish suspending themselves so curiously below there . . and the
beautiful curious liquid . . and the water-plants with their graceful flat heads . .
all became part of him.
the cow's calf, and the noisy brood of the barnyard or by the mire of the pond-
side . . and the fish suspending themselves so curiously below there . . and the
beautiful curious liquid . . and the water-plants with their graceful flat heads . .
all became part of him.
2193
And the field-sprouts of April and May became part of him . . . . wintergrain sprouts,
and those of the light-yellow corn, and of the esculent roots of the garden,
and those of the light-yellow corn, and of the esculent roots of the garden,
2194
And the appletrees covered with blossoms, and the fruit afterward . . . . and wood-
berries . . and the commonest weeds by the road;
berries . . and the commonest weeds by the road;
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 91
2195
And the old drunkard staggering home from the outhouse of the tavern whence he
had lately risen,
had lately risen,
2196
And the schoolmistress that passed on her way to the school . . and the friendly boys
that passed . . and the quarrelsome boys . . and the tidy and freshcheeked girls . .
and the barefoot negro boy and girl,
that passed . . and the quarrelsome boys . . and the tidy and freshcheeked girls . .
and the barefoot negro boy and girl,
2197
And all the changes of city and country wherever he went.
2198
His own parents . . he that had propelled the fatherstuff at night, and fathered him . .
and she that conceived him in her womb and birthed him . . . . they gave this
child more of themselves than that,
and she that conceived him in her womb and birthed him . . . . they gave this
child more of themselves than that,
2199
They gave him afterward every day . . . . they and of them became part of him.
2200
The mother at home quietly placing the dishes on the suppertable,
2201
The mother with mild words . . . . clean her cap and gown . . . . a wholesome odor
falling off her person and clothes as she walks by:
falling off her person and clothes as she walks by:
2202
The father, strong, selfsufficient, manly, mean, angered, unjust,
2203
The blow, the quick loud word, the tight bargain, the crafty lure,
2204
The family usages, the language, the company, the furniture . . . . the yearning and
swelling heart,
swelling heart,
2205
Affection that will not be gainsayed . . . . The sense of what is real . . . . the thought
if after all it should prove unreal,
if after all it should prove unreal,
2206
The doubts of daytime and the doubts of nighttime . . . the curious whether and how,
2207
Whether that which appears so is so . . . . Or is it all flashes and specks?
2208
Men and women crowding fast in the streets . . if they are not flashes and specks
what are they?
what are they?
2209
The streets themselves, and the facades of houses . . . . the goods in the windows,
2210
Vehicles . . teams . . the tiered wharves, and the huge crossing at the ferries;
2211
The village on the highland seen from afar at sunset . . . . the river between,
2212
Shadows . . aureola and mist . . light falling on roofs and gables of white or brown,
three miles off,
three miles off,
2213
The schooner near by sleepily dropping down the tide . . the little boat slacktowed
astern,
astern,
2214
The hurrying tumbling waves and quickbroken crests and slapping;
2215
The strata of colored clouds . . . . the long bar of maroontint away solitary by
itself . . . . the spread of purity it lies motionless in,
itself . . . . the spread of purity it lies motionless in,
2216
The horizon's edge, the flying seacrow, the fragrance of saltmarsh and shoremud;
2217
These became part of that child who went forth every day, and who now goes and
will always go forth every day,
will always go forth every day,
2218
And these become of him or her that peruses them now.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
92 Leaves of Grass.
2219
WHO learns my lesson complete?
2220
Boss and journeyman and apprentice? . . . . churchman and atheist?
2221
The stupid and the wise thinker . . . . parents and offspring . . . . merchant and clerk
and porter and customer . . . . editor, author, artist and schoolboy?
and porter and customer . . . . editor, author, artist and schoolboy?
2222
Draw nigh and commence,
2223
It is no lesson . . . . it lets down the bars to a good lesson,
2224
And that to another . . . . and every one to another still.
2225
The great laws take and effuse without argument,
2226
I am of the same style, for I am their friend,
2227
I love them quits and quits . . . . I do not halt and make salaams.
2228
I lie abstracted and hear beautiful tales of things and the reasons of things,
2229
They are so beautiful I nudge myself to listen.
2230
I cannot say to any person what I hear . . . . I cannot say it to myself . . . . it is
very wonderful.
very wonderful.
2231
It is no little matter, this round and delicious globe, moving so exactly in its orbit
forever and ever, without one jolt or the untruth of a single second;
forever and ever, without one jolt or the untruth of a single second;
2232
I do not think it was made in six days, nor in ten thousand years, nor ten decillions
of years,
of years,
2233
Nor planned and built one thing after another, as an architect plans and builds a house.
2234
I do not think seventy years is the time of a man or woman,
2235
Nor that seventy millions of years is the time of a man or woman,
2236
Nor that years will ever stop the existence of me or any one else.
2237
Is it wonderful that I should be immortal? as every one is immortal,
2238
I know it is wonderful . . . . but my eyesight is equally wonderful . . . . and how I was
conceived in my mother's womb is equally wonderful,
conceived in my mother's womb is equally wonderful,
2239
And how I was not palpable once but am now . . . . and was born on the last day of
May 1819 . . . . and passed from a babe in the creeping trance of three summers
and three winters to articulate and walk . . . . are all equally wonderful.
May 1819 . . . . and passed from a babe in the creeping trance of three summers
and three winters to articulate and walk . . . . are all equally wonderful.
2240
And that I grew six feet high . . . . and that I have become a man thirty-six years old
in 1855 . . . . and that I am here anyhow—are all equally wonderful;
in 1855 . . . . and that I am here anyhow—are all equally wonderful;
2241
And that my soul embraces you this hour, and we affect each other without ever
seeing each other, and never perhaps to see each other, is every bit as
wonderful:
seeing each other, and never perhaps to see each other, is every bit as
wonderful:
2242
And that I can think such thoughts as these is just as wonderful,
2243
And that I can remind you, and you think them and know them to be true is just as
wonderful,
wonderful,
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Leaves of Grass. 93
2244
And that the moon spins round the earth and on with the earth is equally wonderful,
2245
And that they balance themselves with the sun and stars is equally wonderful.
2246
Come I should like to hear you tell me what there is in yourself that is not just as
wonderful,
wonderful,
2247
And I should like to hear the name of anything between Sunday morning and
Saturday night that is not just as wonderful.
Saturday night that is not just as wonderful.
2248
GREAT are the myths . . . . I too delight in them,
2249
Great are Adam and Eve . . . . I too look back and accept them;
2250
Great the risen and fallen nations, and their poets, women, sages, inventors, rulers,
warriors and priests.
warriors and priests.
2251
Great is liberty! Great is equality! I am their follower,
2252
Helmsmen of nations, choose your craft . . . . where you sail I sail,
2253
Yours is the muscle of life or death . . . . yours is the perfect science . . . . in you I
have absolute faith.
have absolute faith.
2254
Great is today, and beautiful,
2255
It is good to live in this age . . . . there never was any better.
2256
Great are the plunges and throes and triumphs and falls of democracy,
2257
Great the reformers with their lapses and screams,
2258
Great the daring and venture of sailors on new explorations.
2259
Great are yourself and myself,
2260
We are just as good and bad as the oldest and youngest or any,
2261
What the best and worst did we could do,
2262
What they felt . . do not we feel it in ourselves?
2263
What they wished . . do we not wish the same?
2264
Great is youth, and equally great is old age . . . . great are the day and night;
2265
Great is wealth and great is poverty . . . . great is expression and great is silence.
2266
Youth large lusty and loving . . . . youth full of grace and force and fascination,
2267
Do you know that old age may come after you with equal grace and force and
fascination?
fascination?
2268
Day fullblown and splendid . . . . day of the immense sun, and action and ambition
and laughter,
and laughter,
2269
The night follows close, with millions of suns, and sleep and restoring darkness.
2270
with the flush hand and fine clothes and hospitality:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [page break] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
94 Leaves of Grass.
2271
But then the soul's wealth—which is candor and knowledge and pride and enfolding
love:
love:
2272
Who goes for men and women showing poverty richer than wealth?
2273
Expression of speech . . in what is written or said forget not that silence is also
expressive,
expressive,
2274
That anguish as hot as the hottest and contempt as cold as the coldest may be with-
out words,
out words,
2275
That the true adoration is likewise without words and without kneeling.
2276
Great is the greatest nation . . the nation of clusters of equal nations.
2277
Great is the earth, and the way it became what it is,
2278
Do you imagine it is stopped at this? . . . . and the increase abandoned?
2279
Understand then that it goes as far onward from this as this is from the times when
it lay in covering waters and gases.
it lay in covering waters and gases.
2280
Great is the quality of truth in man,
2281
The quality of truth in man supports itself through all changes,
2282
It is inevitably in the man . . . . He and it are in love, and never leave each other.
2283
The truth in man is no dictum . . . . it is vital as eyesight,
2284
If there be any soul there is truth . . . . if there be man or woman there is truth . . . .
If there be physical or moral there is truth,
If there be physical or moral there is truth,
2285
If there be equilibrium or volition there is truth . . . . if there be things at all upon the
earth there is truth.
earth there is truth.
2286
O truth of the earth! O truth of things! I am determined to press the whole way
toward you,
toward you,
2287
Sound your voice! I scale mountains or dive in the sea after you.
2288
Great is language . . . . it is the mightiest of the sciences,
2289
It is the fulness and color and form and diversity of the earth . . . . and of men and
women . . . . and of all qualities and processes;
women . . . . and of all qualities and processes;
2290
It is greater than wealth . . . . it is greater than buildings or ships or religions or
paintings or music.
paintings or music.
2291
Great is the English speech . . . . What speech is so great as the English?
2292
Great is the English brood . . . . What brood has so vast a destiny as the English?
2293
It is the mother of the brood that must rule the earth with the new rule,
2294
The new rule shall rule as the soul rules, and as the love and justice and equality
that are in the soul rule.
that are in the soul rule.
2295
Great is the law . . . . Great are the old few landmarks of the law . . . . they are the
same in all times and shall not be disturbed.
same in all times and shall not be disturbed.
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Leaves of Grass. 95
2296
Great are marriage, commerce, newspapers, books, freetrade, railroads, steamers,
international mails and telegraphs and exchanges.
international mails and telegraphs and exchanges.
2297
Great is Justice;
2298
Justice is not settled by legislators and laws . . . . it is in the soul,
2299
It cannot be varied by statutes any more than love or pride or the attraction of
gravity can,
gravity can,
2300
It is immutable . . it does not depend on majorities . . . . majorities or what not come
at last before the same passionless and exact tribunal.
at last before the same passionless and exact tribunal.
2301
For justice are the grand natural lawyers and perfect judges . . . . it is in their souls,
2302
It is well assorted . . . . they have not studied for nothing . . . . the great includes the
less,
less,
2303
They rule on the highest grounds . . . . they oversee all eras and states and
administrations,
administrations,
2304
The perfect judge fears nothing . . . . he could go front to front before God,
2305
Before the perfect judge all shall stand back . . . . life and death shall stand back
. . . . heaven and hell shall stand back.
. . . . heaven and hell shall stand back.
2306
Great is goodness;
2307
I do not know what it is any more than I know what health is . . . . but I know it is
great.
great.
2308
Great is wickedness . . . . I find I often admire it just as much as I admire good-
ness:
ness:
2309
Do you call that a paradox? It certainly is a paradox.
2310
The eternal equilibrium of things is great, and the eternal overthrow of things is
great,
great,
2311
And there is another paradox.
2312
Great is life . . and real and mystical . . wherever and whoever,
2313
Great is death . . . . Sure as life holds all parts together, death holds all parts
together;
together;
2314
Sure as the stars return again after they merge in the light, death is great as life.
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